Three long overlooked problems with this game. - Page 3

camycamera · 2013-06-26, 07:50 PM

^ there we go, we got an acknowledgement from a dev! now we only need an acknowledgement from them regarding the terrible base design....

wasdie · 2013-06-26, 09:20 PM

Originally Posted by Malorn

The flow problems that drop pods and reinforcements needed create have not gone unnoticed. I'm looking into changes in these areas to address these problems but cannot provide details or ETAs.

Please keep providing feedback! We do pay attention to your posts, even though we may not reply to most of them.

Well that's excellent to hear.

basti · 2013-06-26, 11:29 PM

Originally Posted by bpostal

I think this right here is the main issue with the under utilization of the Galaxy in PS2. You previously needed a galaxy to gain any kind of coordinated vertical advantage such as dropping on a roof, now you just need to get one guy close enough to the drop zone.
I know the Sunderer already has too many roles for it to be utilized as simple gun truck but it's really the only vehicle I can see being used as an electronic warfare vehicle. Slap that 'SOI Generator' that somebody was talking about earlier in the thread onto a bang bus instead of ammo or whatever and have it toss up a few hundred meters of SOI.
The more I think about it, the more it seems a natural pairing with the AMS. Sure, now people can't drop on your shit but you'll be throwing up a huge signal flare to anyone who can look at the map "Here's my bus!"

I would rather have a new vehicle for that stuff. The ANT pretty much.

Assuming NTU makes it back for the resource overhaul (OHGOD PLEASE PLEASE), and the ANT comes along, it needs a few roles more than just being a truck for nanites. A support vehicle that does new stuff like SOIs that prevent drop pods from entering, mobile jump pad, Huge huge radar or other stuff would propably do good. Pretty much support abilitys on a much lighter armored vehicle. Sundys need to be right in the action for its support functions like AMS, repair, rearm etc. ANTs could be the guys behind the action, provoding new ways of support.

Dodgy Commando · 2013-06-27, 05:03 AM

Section 8 had a pretty good take on the ability to spawn literally anywhere on the map. It was countered by AA mainly, similar to what has already been mentioned here.

But I reckon such a concept would require a great deal of work. SOI feels more Planetside (whether ANT/Generator/whatever else may be suggested). It could definitely add an extra layer to battles with seek & destroy hopping between the defense and offense.

I have to say I haven't experienced the same frustrations as others have mentioned here, which is probably why I wasn't in agreement on a lot of points. I still think its an interesting tactic, which can indeed be quite overpowering by its very nature of course.

I still don't think we should do away with drop pods altogether, though.

It clearly exarcerbates population differences quickly, hence the problems. If organised teams secured roofs/CY against hot drops, the rest of the defenders could concentrate on pushing back the enemy. In an ideal world

ringring · 2013-06-27, 05:36 AM

I've often thought that one way to make the gal more useful would be by increasing the impact of a violent and sudden insertion of troops and the way to do that is to make a resecure hack move faster that a capture hack.

Qwan · 2013-06-27, 06:19 AM

Originally Posted by wasdie

But that's a terrible tactic. Why have base defense at all? It ruins any flow of battle and is just not fun to defend againt in the long run and is a major reason why people hate the bases in this game. You cannot defend against people drop podding behind you or on your flanks constantly.

In Planetside 1 we had to find the AMS and destroy it, which was fine, but the counter-attack didn't require the defenders to risk having people constantly drop behind the line from magical drop pods that could drop them right into their base. At the worst you had a galaxy drop people behind the line or your back door hacked. Right now you can't even have an active defense because leaving your battlements means the enemy can easily get right into your base.

This tactic is bad game design and is really hurting the flow of battle which has a direct impact in the overall metagame.

On that note, you have to push out, break that link so to say to prevent enemies from hacking your position. Now thanks to the lattice system, I mean once a base is secure, you can push on to the next base, their by taking away the enemies ability to hack the base you just took. Now during the initial defence yea the enemy can get behind you, but you have to take the fight to them, you see the link that they have, you have to take that away from them. Once a hack is started from there link they can no longer hack the base that there dropping on to.

wasdie · 2013-06-27, 09:06 AM

Originally Posted by Qwan

On that note, you have to push out, break that link so to say to prevent enemies from hacking your position. Now thanks to the lattice system, I mean once a base is secure, you can push on to the next base, their by taking away the enemies ability to hack the base you just took. Now during the initial defence yea the enemy can get behind you, but you have to take the fight to them, you see the link that they have, you have to take that away from them. Once a hack is started from there link they can no longer hack the base that there dropping on to.

This is of course a useful tactic but it can be constantly shut down by a constant drop of spawn deploy or squad beacon launched drop pods behind your line onto your connected lattice facility. You have to leave a lot of people on guard duty if you want to make a push because a single drop pod could halt an entire attack.

It's not a good mechanic when you're looking at overall flow of this game. A squad shouldn't be dropping one guy behind the line with an ESF or running around as an infiltrator and then be able to summon their entire squad from all over the map to them via the squad beacon or the squad deploy. They should utilize a galaxy for that. There is a reason galaxies hold 12 people.

Right now the galaxy is kind of a bust thanks to these other mechanics.

In a more Planetside like world a platoon would utilize a mixture of gal drops and AMSs to move up, not just fly some ESFs in and drop a squad beacon or get a squad deploy on the hex like they do now. The galaxies would drop the initial attack where they could get a jump on a lightly defended base while the sunderers make a push from a connected facility and set up. The gal dropped soldiers would then have to hold what they have until reinforcements arrive. Right now they can continue to spawn their own reinforcements and overwhelm a lightly defended base without having to worry about logistics in the slightest.

Lucidius · 2013-06-27, 02:44 PM

An example: We were taking over zurvan amp station. The defenders successfully blew up all of our spawn logistics. With that they could have picked us off and gained control of the bases interior. Instead, everyone in the squad just squad deployed back into the base and we overwhelmed the defenders.

^ This is a good tactic because what was the point of defending the sunderer or the squad beacon?

NewSith · 2013-06-27, 04:43 PM

Originally Posted by Malorn

The flow problems that drop pods and reinforcements needed create have not gone unnoticed. I'm looking into changes in these areas to address these problems but cannot provide details or ETAs.

Please keep providing feedback! We do pay attention to your posts, even though we may not reply to most of them.

Did anyone even consider the downside of removing the thing now? I bet 100 steady bucks on that if it's done, there's gonna be way less defending again. On the Lattice this time.

Ralek · 2013-06-28, 01:16 AM

OP talks about logistics a lot - beacons and squad deploy are exactly that - logistic tools. There are obviously a few issues with them though.

Squad deploy was broken a few updates back. You used to not be able to squad deploy on dead squad leaders, but now you can, meaning after you kill a squad you have to wait for their bodies to spawn somewhere to be sure area is clear.

The squad beacon mechanics actually work surprisingly well. It's not that hard to keep an eye out for them and it adds a layer for organized small outfits to be helpful on large fights, by using them or denying them to the enemy. The rendering issue on the beacons could use fixing and I'd add a timer (15s ?) before a deployed beacon goes "active" to give the defenders a window to kill it before it can be used.

The major problem with dropping right now, IMO, are not the beacons or squad deploy - its the actual drop pods themselves and the rendering mechanics. You can have a full squad waiting in a circle around the drop pod location and the dropper will still have around 2s free reign before it renders, making ANY sundy within drop range DOA for any organized group.

I'd suggest the following changes:
- Whenever a drop pod lands, put a ping on the minimap, similar to an infil dart pulse, only in empire colors
- Make the drop pods land with their landing doors closed, have the dropper render inside and then slowly (2s ?) open the doors. The drop pod should be vunerable during this period - I'd make it armored (immune to small arms) and take slightly more than a default launcher hit to kill.

Wahooo · 2013-06-28, 02:29 AM

Originally Posted by Dodgy Commando

It clearly exarcerbates population differences quickly, hence the problems. If organised teams secured roofs/CY against hot drops, the rest of the defenders could concentrate on pushing back the enemy. In an ideal world

This actually highlights a LOT of the expectations people have for OTHER people doing certain jobs, like defending meaningless outposts pre-lattice. Like AA duty. AMP station/Techplant roof duty.

If you are doing the job right basically you get a few minutes of action and then nothing. Which is of course why these jobs are always suggested for others to do. Because they get boring as fuck very quickly, but then as soon as you ignore it to go play the game like everyone else gets to a handful of drop podders come in and next thing you know all of the defenders focused on the the attackers out THERE suddenly are hosed by the attackers behind them.

when this thread started I was tending to disagree with the premises of spawn beacons and squad deploy being bad. I like them, I use them, they are fun/useful. But the more I thought about it MY perspective was based on comparing the current mechanic to the drop pod deploy/instant action that allowed squads to just poof show up on the roof of an amp station without any kind of beacon or squad leader (plus the short time Maxes were allowed to hot drop as well).

I'm pretty much in agreement wtih the OP on this one now.

Roy Awesome · 2013-06-28, 04:00 AM

I thought Section 8 handled the drop-pod issue very well. Players could deploy Anti-Drop Pod flak guns that shot down incoming reinformcents. The area at which you could deploy was very clearly marked, and lead to very interesting fights and the creation of area denial.

A simple SOI is too boring. Let us create our field to fight in.

SadlyJack · 2013-06-28, 05:13 AM

Introduce circles of influence around bases, disallowing drop pods within the circle.

Apply the same anti-drop pod influence circle to the sunderer no deploy circle because dropping on a sundy and C4'ing it before your model even renders is bullshit and you know it.

Remove squad deploy; it is every squad leader's "fuck you" button. If the battle isn't going your way; press squad deploy to win.

Increase height of spawn beacon beam dramatically, similar to the beacon from the BLUR trailer.

Make squad beacon vunerable to explosives so tanks and aircraft can support infantry by taking them out. Right now you can fire HEAT at one and it'll do diddly.

Circle of influence creates the problem of not knowing where your drop pod will land. So either;

A) right click map screen to choose your drop pod location in deploy screen, outside of the circle of influence. You cannot steer the pod.

B) use another invisible circle outside of base's circle of influence that can be dropped into. Deployment screen chooses any random area inside that circle for your drop pod to land in.

Makes drop podding a gamble instead of a straight up improvement from actual logistics. A Sunderer or Gal will take longer but have a better chance of getting you to the fight safely, making them more viable options for the average joes on the ground.

Rahabib · 2013-06-28, 09:45 AM

The one nice thing about a circle of influence is that it makes galaxies that much more useful. Gal drop a squad in, drop a spawn beacon and you are in business.

I dont think that spawn beacons are a big issue. You cant spam the squad deploy. It makes it that much more important to take them out just as it is for sunderers. I would say that it should be worth much more XP to take them out and a cool down timer on using them should be very high.

KeyboardWarrior · 2013-06-28, 11:30 AM

My 2 cents.

Instant action drop pods should be not be in the game. Keep the instant action system, however, link it to friendly spawns rather than drop podding people. Someone pressing instant action would appear at the nearest Sunderer or spawn room to a fight, like the insert in warp gate while in a squad type of deploy.

Replace the squad deploy mechanic with the spawn in friendly transport vehicle mechanic that you have in the works. It would be much less abusable. Maybe lower the timer somewhat from 5 minutes though.

The drop beacon/mechanic is maybe a little harder. Maybe link it to the squad leader or highest concentration of squad members and reduce the amount you have can steer the pod quite dramatically.

Or beacons could be a two part system. Place the actual beacon exactly like now. However, also have the SL have a second item in the weapon slots that allows him/her to place a target marker for drops pods. No cooldown on the marker. Then make drop pods much harder to steer. Without the marker down drop pods will go straight down on the beacon.