Footholds Archetypes: "Food for Thought"

[Madlaps]

I believe that may be the problem, Planetside 2 doesn't have the "Global domination" aspect that Planetside 1 had. It's more, BF3/MW enlarged 2000%.

What made Planetside 1 great wasnt just the continents were huge, it's that back in the day - you went to take a continent AND base for a particular reason. It had a link to somewhere you wanted or it had benefits that you wanted for your faction. PS2 loses this, by making the continents practically large individual battlegrounds. Resources are just another form of XP, which you get by fighting ANYWHERE - Sure, bases give different resources - but it is impossible to mediate the resource economy like this....

Think about it, if you HAVE to take a certain base for resources that you are required to get to pull certain vehicles... how the hell are you spose to retake bases or progress in a continent if your faction is getting dominated and is out of resources?? "It's ok guys, we got no resources for vehicles - so we'll verse this defending faction with foot soldiers verse hundreds of tanks and aircraft - as well as foot soliders"

Are foothold vehicles going to be free? If so, then it just produces more of a stalemate on continents as anything remotely near your base is many times easier to defend and forces the fight back onto "even" ground in the centre of the map.

You can't do that, so the resource economy will most likely be flooded and there will be no real reason to take bases other than "for a good fight". Which comes back to my first point. The "tactical" or "strategic" aspect that gave birth to all these military and organised outfits is gone.

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Yes, I have made exaggerated assumptions without playing beta. Yes, I'll happily eat my boot if SOE brings this aspect into the game. Yes, I love this game, genre and what the devs have done for us as much as anyone else here. The majority of changes to make this a modern FPS I can completely see why it's done and why we need non-PS players and why we must make sacrifices to attract new blood.

But I believe this is the greatest difference between the two games and while it might be an "epic" war. It is losing the very core of what gives this genre great potential. You need an epic war, with a greater underlying purpose to what you're fighting over.

[erunion]

Originally Posted by Malorn

The general idea that I believe people like is that idea that you start off on different continents, but they all connect in various ways and you meet int he middle and fight across different landscapes.

The concern I have about that, especially with the hex system, is it would lead to a lot of underutilized space. I get the feeling that the home continents would see little combat with the (few?) neutral continent(s) continually changing hands.

On the other hand, I don't think each faction having a foothold on each continent is a good idea.

[Mechzz]

Originally Posted by Madlaps

...
Are foothold vehicles going to be free? If so, then it just produces more of a stalemate on continents as anything remotely near your base is many times easier to defend and forces the fight back onto "even" ground in the centre of the map.

You can't do that, so the resource economy will most likely be flooded and there will be no real reason to take bases other than "for a good fight". Which comes back to my first point. The "tactical" or "strategic" aspect that gave birth to all these military and organised outfits is gone.....

These points are valid, and the best way to get round them will be to introduce more continents so we can get that variety to the gameplay. And for that, timing will be everything. Too soon, and the huge new player base may not be ready for it. Too late and people will have drifted off.

Big challenge for SOE here - the first expansion could make or break the game!

[erunion]

Originally Posted by Madlaps

I believe that may be the problem, Planetside 2 doesn't have the "Global domination" aspect that Planetside 1 had. It's more, BF3/MW enlarged 2000%.

My fear is that that description applies in many other ways too. From E3 it looks as if they have turned bases into a field to play a game of MW domination. And after someone wins that game...i mean battle, we advance to the next map...I mean base.

[CutterJohn]

There should be no 'home' continents. Footholds on all of the continents.

Empires can choose their own 'homes' that they defend because of tradition.

[Malorn]

Originally Posted by erunion

The concern I have about that, especially with the hex system, is it would lead to a lot of underutilized space. I get the feeling that the home continents would see little combat with the (few?) neutral continent(s) continually changing hands.

On the other hand, I don't think each faction having a foothold on each continent is a good idea.

I think you hit the nail on the head with space utilization. With only 3 continents we don't have a lot of space, so we need utilization to be high, which the #1 option (current design) maximizes.

However it comes at a price of the metagame strategy. It is difficult to have both high utilization and high metagame, because the idea behind the metagame is securing territory and moving on - if its secured, nobody's using it anymore, until it is once again threatened.

It's like playing chess on a 3x3 board - not very interesting. But when the board is 10x10, lot more options, but not a lot is happening on most of the board.

Home continents are a fantastic strategic concept, and people really liked the idea of calling something "home" or more accurately "ours" - there's pride there, and home conts were often fought for a lot more fiercely than others.

However, home continents also created a lot of stagnation, as much of the home continent was often not utilized and battles took place largely on warpgate-connected bases (or territories if you translated it to PS2). It also meant that you typically only played in places connected to the home continent. So there was much of the game that you rarely saw, which was unfortunate. I don't think home continents work out well with low space.



Great observation about space utilization, I think that captures the issue quite concisely. Current PS has low space, high utilization. PS1 had high space and low utilization. We probably want something more like high space and medium utilization so its not too stagnant, but there are also strategic options for the metagame.

[Malorn]

Originally Posted by Madlaps

I believe that may be the problem, Planetside 2 doesn't have the "Global domination" aspect that Planetside 1 had. It's more, BF3/MW enlarged 2000%.

What made Planetside 1 great wasnt just the continents were huge, it's that back in the day - you went to take a continent AND base for a particular reason. It had a link to somewhere you wanted or it had benefits that you wanted for your faction. PS2 loses this, by making the continents practically large individual battlegrounds.

I absolutely agree. However, I also believe that PS2 can ship with the current continent configuration and be successful. As they add more continents I hope we can re-evaluate the situation so we get that global domination system working.

Global domination and conquest benefits, etc - those would all make a great content patch and a compelling release for PS post-launch. Hell they could call it that "PlanetSide 2 - Global Domination Patch!" Exciting!

Very important for me for them to do that, but I recognize that it doesn't need to happen on day 1. We can wait a bit for it, but I hope not too long.

Resources are just another form of XP, which you get by fighting ANYWHERE - Sure, bases give different resources - but it is impossible to mediate the resource economy like this....

You also got into the Rich-get-Richer problem and what I'm now calling the "Free Resources" problem, both of which revolve around resource balancing.

On one end you have highly dependent resources - the territory system matters a lot, and the resources you own are very important. In this world people care a lot about territory because they have to. However, the downside is that because territory matters so much the rich get richer, and the poor get poorer. At some point they can't realistically fight back and the rich have all the resources to wage war and hold onto a continent. Clearly that wont' work, at least not without some diminishing returns which sort of defeats the purpose.

The way that PS2 appears to solve this problem is by having two methods of obtaining resources - from territories, but also from fighting. If you're fighting you get resources (that's how Higby described it, but we don't know many details more than that). This is a good idea because it helps take some pressure off the resources from territories and gives a way for the "poor" to fight back, as long as they have the will to fight.

The problem with that, and what I now call the "free resources" problem is that resources are effectively free. If you get them for fighting, then why care about territories? We've effectively gone to the other end of the spectrum from where territory was extremely important to where it isn't really important at all.

Of course they could strike a balance - a point where territory is noticeably helpful, AND you get a small to fair amount of resources from fighting. The goal would be to provide enough resources from fighting that a fiscally conservative player could get by and provide what is needed to keep waging war. However, he would still much prefer more territory so his resources aren't stretched thin.

It's very difficult to get this balance right, because one of the things they wanted to enable was resource starvation - the idea that you could take a specific territory to weaken the resource pool of the enemy for a certain type of resource. The goal would be to deprive the enemy of aircraft or tanks, or at least lessen the supply. If too many resources are awarded by fighting then resource starvation is not a viable tactic. Or if the resource pools on players are too big starvation's effect won't be seen wide-scale enough to matter. The effect we want is like capturing the only enemy Tech plant or dropping its generator - no more tanks. That really only plays well if you have a highly resource-dpeendent system.

So its a really hard problem to get this right. Once I'm in beta it'll likely be something I spend a lot of time watching, playing with, and figuring out. I'm really curious how it plays out and what other solutions we might have to help strike the right balance.

[Madlaps]

Originally Posted by CutterJohn

There should be no 'home' continents. Footholds on all of the continents.

Empires can choose their own 'homes' that they defend because of tradition.

Tradition has been removed to make it easier to get into a fight and not worry about defending home continents.

[Traenor]

I think people undervalue the strategitical oppurtunities there is even with footholds on each continent. As far as i hear about PS1, the metagame primarily were about locking down continents and moving on to other continents? With the foothold system, and resources, you are pushed a lot more towards aggresive strategies wherein you try to deny as many facilities as possible, instead of a "safe" route wherein you create an impregnable front. I am not saying that this will create a more diverse metagame, just that the metagame might not suffer as much as people think. With all that said, i would like to see some smaller conts with the possibility of total domination by one faction.

[erunion]

Originally Posted by Malorn

I think you hit the nail on the head with space utilization.

Thanks, Malorn. Those points are what got me thinking about the 5th option I mentioned higher up. I was looking for something that would work in the current low real-estate environment, but brings in new landscape in a meaningful way.

The advantages I think it has are 1) its ready to go, current map doesn't have be changed. And 2) when new continents are added and connected by warpgates, I think an interesting dynamic would occur. Fighting would continue to be intense on the original continent due to close proximity of the factions, but would also travel from area of high concentration to areas of low concentration as people moved into the new continents to find more easily conquered territory. Depending on how the continents are linked a sort of home turf could even be developed.

[Malorn]

Originally Posted by erunion

Thanks, Malorn. Those points are what got me thinking about the 5th option I mentioned higher up. I was looking for something that would work in the current low real-estate environment, but brings in new landscape in a meaningful way.

I advantages I think it has is its ready to go, current map doesn't have be changed. And when new continents are added and connected by warpgates, I think an interesting dynamic would occur. Fighting would continue to be intense on the original continent due to close proximity of the factions, but would also travel from area of high concentration to areas of low concentration as people moved into the new continents to find more easily conquered territory. Depending on how the continents are linked a sort of home turf could even be developed.

The dual-foothold design where two empires have a foothold but the third does not - that's a design that existed before and it did indeed lead to a lot of fighting on that continent. It's similar to the three-foothold idea of yours.

What ended up happening with that design though is that so much fighting occured on the dual continents that you didn't get a lot of fighting on other conitnents. Some stayed locked/dead for hours, even days. So it created high utilization of a few continents, but very low utilization of others. I think we shoudl try to find a way to have moderate utilization across a large number of continents. I think that is the holy grail of planetside metagame. I'm still searching for it

[Madlaps]

Originally Posted by Traenor

I think people undervalue the strategitical oppurtunities there is even with footholds on each continent. As far as i hear about PS1, the metagame primarily were about locking down continents and moving on to other continents? With the foothold system, and resources, you are pushed a lot more towards aggresive strategies wherein you try to deny as many facilities as possible, instead of a "safe" route wherein you create an impregnable front. I am not saying that this will create a more diverse metagame, just that the metagame might not suffer as much as people think. With all that said, i would like to see some smaller conts with the possibility of total domination by one faction.

I agree, but I think the main point is that strategies based on resources is going to be impossible to manage. As it will either cause one or two factions to get all the resources and one to get none (or some combination there of), making it near impossible to recover (remember there is no reset or end game).

Or... it will be flooded completely with resources making the whole idea of resource starvation or targetting a base for the sole purpose of resources completely moot.

[Dagron]

Originally Posted by Malorn

However, there is a darker side to it which I dont' go into in the manifesto that has become apparent to me more recently - downtime & staleness.

Yeah, i can see those things happening.

Originally Posted by erunion

The concern I have about that, especially with the hex system, is it would lead to a lot of underutilized space. I get the feeling that the home continents would see little combat with the (few?) neutral continent(s) continually changing hands.

On the other hand, I don't think each faction having a foothold on each continent is a good idea.

Originally Posted by Malorn

And it also led to only seeing a small portion of the game world without a lot of variety. It was the same battles, same bases, same opponent, same continent, day after day.
(...)
The footholds help alleviate those challenges and make it easier to attack. It also allows you to see more of the game world...

Actually, that's the exact same reason why i'm a little afraid of footholds: people keep talking about how a foothold siege would go, but i think they're going to be rare... which means most of the time, everyone will be fighting in the very center of every continent (we won't see much of each map, just the area from our foothold to a little beyond the center).

Originally Posted by Malorn

However, home continents also created a lot of stagnation, as much of the home continent was often not utilized and battles took place largely on warpgate-connected bases (or territories if you translated it to PS2). It also meant that you typically only played in places connected to the home continent. So there was much of the game that you rarely saw, which was unfortunate.

I guess that's why some people suggested that footholds rotated each month in one of the proposed archetypes... though i think that would effectively end the "having a place to call home" perk, they may be on to something. Maybe having an incentive to up and leave your home territory after a while could help make things a little more dynamic.

Originally Posted by Malorn

So if you want to drink from the fire hose, there you go! Lot of thoughts and relation to global and continental strategy there and learnings from PS1 onto PS2.

Damn you, i really should be working... my class project is due today and i haven't started yet!

[Malorn]

Originally Posted by Dagron

Actually, that's the exact same reason why i'm a little afraid of footholds: people keep talking about how a foothold siege would go, but i think they're going to be rare... which means most of the time, everyone will be fighting in the very center of every continent (we won't see much of each map, just the area from our foothold to a little beyond the center).

I think there will be a lot of flanking the sides, but generally I share your concern in that we'll only see maybe 40-50% of a continent most of the time due to the adjacency system creating fronts and having 3 empires keeping each other's fronts in check.

I guess that's why some people suggested that footholds rotated each month in one of the proposed archetypes... though i think that would effectively end the "having a place to call home" perk, they may be on to something. Maybe having an incentive to up and leave your home territory after a while could help make things a little more dynamic.

Yep, I've been a big proponent of the rotating footholds, probably not a big surprise there.
http://www.planetside-universe.com/s...ad.php?t=36782

Its more about freshness than anything else - giving us new angles on the same continent so even though we only have 3 continents we really make the most of them and have different battles against different foes in different places. T

Damn you, i really should be working... my class project is due today and i haven't started yet!

I need to sleep too, good discussion in this thread tonight. But my posts have been there for months, they aren't going anywhere. Get your project done!

[erunion]

Originally Posted by Malorn

So it created high utilization of a few continents, but very low utilization of others. I think we shoudl try to find a way to have moderate utilization across a large number of continents. I think that is the holy grail of planetside metagame. I'm still searching for it

While I do not claim to have any holy grails. I don't think my suggestion would have that PS1 problem much.

Likely the prime continent would see regular fighting but little movement of boundaries while the additional continents would see less regular combat but much more widely fluctuating borders. Sort of the opposite of the home continent idea, and adding much sought after diversification of game play.

The caveat is how to connect the continents. And I do still like the idea of separate home continents if given enough individual continents.