Confirmed: 9 Sanctuaries at launch.

[TheDrone]

Originally Posted by Malorn

As Cutter put it so eloquently...

Foothold = Sanctuary + Warpgate - Loading Screen

This speeds up the pacing of the game and removes the crappiness that was continent locks. Not having this will lead to worse gameplay.

Absolutely.

Continent locks are a more or less arbitrary victory condition decided upon by the community.

New such conditions could emerge.

[Malorn]

Originally Posted by Raymac

1. I have a problem with an empire being locked out of 1 or 2 continents when there are 3 continents total. I see that as being a major point of frustration when your entire empire can only have 600 players on 1 server.

2. I don't see ANY difference in the warpgate being a "transit" warpgate or a warpgate sanctuary. The effect will be exactly the same. You can take all the territory leading up to the warpgate, and that empire will still have to launch their counter attack from that warpgate.

It's a clever idea, but I don't see it as solving any issues but instead creating more. The only thing it serves is the nostalgia of a continent turning a pretty color on the global map. If you really want that, go buy a coloring book.

This.

All this will do is make a single 3-way battle between 3 continents as opposed to 3 different 3-way battles. A major difference is now there's a barrier between the fronts at the warpgates.

Worse, there is now a large amount of territory that will almost never see action.

Imagine only having 3 continents on Planetside. There's no strategy there. It would get very boring, very fast.

Home continents provide nothing but nostalgia, and their price could very well wreck the game.

[acosmo]

Originally Posted by Malorn

A major difference is now there's a barrier between the fronts at the warpgates.

Worse, there is now a large amount of territory that will almost never see action.

Imagine only having 3 continents on Planetside. There's no strategy there. It would get very boring, very fast.

Home continents provide nothing but nostalgia, and their price could very well wreck the game.

You say there's going to be a barrier between fronts at warpgates, but in the 9sanc solution you advocate, the front won't even reach the warpgate. the zerg will take the path of least resistance and hardly anyone will contest hexes outside the enemy's warp.

Imagine only having 3 continents in Planetside 2. There better be some strategy there, otherwise it will get boring, very fast.

Regarding home continents and coloring books, I want a battle that is complex enough to be chaotic, but simple enough to make strategy effective and meaningful. I believe having one foothold/warpsanc per continent will be more conducive to this than a three foothold/warpsanc per continent plan.

Ultimately, they both have pros and cons. I think that one has more depth than the other though.

[Malorn]

You don't need to reach the warpgate if every empire has one on every continent. That expands strategic depth, it doesn't reduce it.

It's the same as if you had a broadcast sanctuary warpgate to every continent. Only you don't have to see a loading screen everytime you want to bring a vehicle to the continent.

[Raymac]

Originally Posted by acosmo

Regarding home continents and coloring books, I want a battle that is complex enough to be chaotic, but simple enough to make strategy effective and meaningful. I believe having one foothold/warpsanc per continent will be more conducive to this than a three foothold/warpsanc per continent plan.

Ultimately, they both have pros and cons. I think that one has more depth than the other though.

But how do you account for the population of 1 empire getting kicked off a continent and having nowhere to go because their "home" continent is pop-locked? All those people will be booted from the server. That is an extremely stupid problem to just ignore.

[acosmo]

Originally Posted by Raymac

But how do you account for the population of 1 empire getting kicked off a continent and having nowhere to go because their "home" continent is pop-locked? All those people will be booted from the server. That is an extremely stupid problem to just ignore.

Forgelight, baby.

[Zulthus]

Just make it simple. The PS1 system worked wonderfully. We'll just have to a adjust it a little bit because there will only be three continents at launch.

Obviously, more continents/planets are going to be added as the game progresses. Each empire gets one specific warpgate that only they can enter and exit. The other three warpgates are usable by all three empires.

***For the first few months of the game before any continents are added, each empire must have one warpgate on each continent. This is to allow them to fight even after their "home" continent is locked. After new continents are added this will not be a problem, and each empire gets one or two home continents depending on how many are available.

There would be some benefits to this.
-Sanctuaries are better than footholds. They're saying these footholds will be "out of bounds" to other empires, which I assume means you get some stupid 10 second countdown to "get back to the field of battle, soldier!" and your screen goes gray. That doesn't make sense at it doesn't belong. ES warpgates WORK because there isn't some artificial out of bounds barrier that kills you in ten seconds, it just means this warpgate does not belong to your empire. You can actually fit that into the lore somehow. Just pulling something out of my ass, I can say that TR and VS nanites are not compatible and the warpgate won't let them through.
-You can stage an assault privately without fear of the other empires seeing what kind of units or how many you are amassing.
-A universal place to spawn and afk. You don't need more than one place for that, and the sanctuary could be a hub for other extensions as the game goes on. Virtual reality, outfit bases, outfit warship construction pads, etc etc.
-You can capture and lock continents from other empires. We can still turn that continent purple without having the fear of being backhacked as soon as we head out to the next continent.
-Probably many more I could keep listing.

Cons
-...uhhh... loading screen?? Waaah




The argument that sanctuaries slow down gameplay is extremely, extremely weak. I have never, EVER heard anyone complain about it taking a minute or two to get your vehicle and go. There are many more benefits to having a sanctuary than there are cons. And, when you come to think of it, there really aren't any cons. That's just nitpicking.

[Stardouser]

I have a question about spawning which might be relevant to some of the matters at hand, and I'm looking more for speculation on PS2's way of doing it than PS1's.

Let's just say you log in to PS2 and there are no other players, no galaxies flying around, no nothing like that, but each team owns 33% of the hex squares across all three continents. Will you be able to choose to spawn at any base within controlled territory?

[Goku]

In PS it was the closet facility and tower you can spawn to. I haven't seen anything that said this is going to be changing.

[Stardouser]

Originally Posted by Goku

In PS it was the closet facility and tower you can spawn to. I haven't seen anything that said this is going to be changing.

Closest to what, where you died? I was talking about your very initial spawn into the game. Are we still expecting you to have to spawn in your home base and take a drop pod elsewhere and then after that you respawn at the closest? In other words, what kind of freedom do you have to enter the game at a location of your choosing when you first log in?

[Raymac]

Originally Posted by Zulthus

The argument that sanctuaries slow down gameplay is extremely, extremely weak. I have never, EVER heard anyone complain about it taking a minute or two to get your vehicle and go. There are many more benefits to having a sanctuary than there are cons. And, when you come to think of it, there really aren't any cons. That's just nitpicking.

Time yourself. From spawning at the Sanc to getting into the fight, even if you are using a Wasp at full afterburn, it will take you more than 2 minutes to get into a fight.

On top of that, if you want to form a raid against a pop-locked continent, you are unable to do it in the safety of a no-fire zone without everyone losing their spot. So you either have to wait who knows how long for everyone in the raid to get through the queue (which in the golden days could take over an hour) or go attack some less meaningful side skirmish. That basically neuters the raid before a shot is ever fired.

The footholds fix both of those.

Also, I picture the footholds as Sactuary warpgates except with structures inside. The friendly empire can go inside but the warpgate shield keeps everyone else out. From what we've seen so far, the PS2 warpgates are just as big if not bigger than the PS1 warpgates.

[Aurmanite]

Originally Posted by Stardouser

Closest to what, where you died? I was talking about your very initial spawn into the game. Are we still expecting you to have to spawn in your home base and take a drop pod elsewhere and then after that you respawn at the closest? In other words, what kind of freedom do you have to enter the game at a location of your choosing when you first log in?

For PS2, we don't know yet.

In the original you came back where ever you logged out. If the facility was not controlled by your empire you were sent back to the Sanctuary. When you first logged in you had the choices of: instant action which sent you to a random battle, taking the shuttle to a continent that wasn't locked, or getting into a vehicle and driving through the warpgate and across the continent.

[Goku]

Yes when you died. When you logged in typically it is where you logged out unless that base/tower was controlled by the enemy. Although going by SOE saying they want people to get into the game quicker it could be selecting what safety zone on whatever cont to selecting a specific base. Remains to be seen I guess.

[Ruwyn]

Originally Posted by Malorn

As Cutter put it so eloquently...

Foothold = Sanctuary + Warpgate - Loading Screen

This speeds up the pacing of the game and removes the crappiness that was continent locks. Not having this will lead to worse gameplay.

I don't know about speeding up the game. For placement at login, maybe. But only if it puts you on the continent with the actual battle you want to fight in. The time to travel, whether from one cont to another and then veh travel, or just veh travel from the foothold, will probably be equal to Hart/Broadcast Warpgates.

The continent lock system worked to focus the battles into large wars. Without it the later yrs and even now would see so many more 4v4 random fights all over.

This "everyone has a guaranteed land" concept does in fact lead to 3 subservers within the main. The server is basically just running 3 different matches that have NOTHING to do with one another. Something you do on Continent A will do nothing to help you on Continent B. I see most if not all tactical play and strategy being stripped away.

Holding out for beta, but more and more it's like someone developing an arena fighting game and slapping Double Dragon IV on it. Fighting game? Yes. Continuing the Double Dragon Franchise? No.

[Raymac]

Originally Posted by Ruwyn

This "everyone has a guaranteed land" concept does in fact lead to 3 subservers within the main. The server is basically just running 3 different matches that have NOTHING to do with one another. Something you do on Continent A will do nothing to help you on Continent B. I see most if not all tactical play and strategy being stripped away.

But it sounds like the resources won on Continent B will also go to the players on Continent A, so they will be connected. The only real connection the continents had in PS1 was the benefits, and I'm probably wrong about this but I think those were added after launch.