Orbital Strike and PS2 - Page 3

SpLiTNuTz · 2012-05-29, 08:29 AM

I can see the OS being right at the top of the command tree so that even if you did have multi characters it would take months to reach the unlock and probably have a few hours cool down.

Gandhi · 2012-05-29, 08:35 AM

You should never rely on resource costs alone to balance things. Titans in EVE were a great example of this mistake, they were supposed to be incredibly rare because they were incredibly expensive to build, and that was the justification for making them incredibly powerful. Well of course it didn't take long before each major empire could field 5 or 6 of them in any engagement, and they had to be nerfed hard. That nerf took its sweet time though, and until it showed up Titans single handedly ruined 0.0 warfare.

If we have a resource cap in PS2 then you could solve this problem by making the cost of an OS be only slightly lower than this cap, meaning firing one brings you down to near 0. And of course this only works if you only earn resources while you're actively playing. If you can earn them offline there's nothing to stop people from making OS alts.

edit: And this still doesn't avoid the problem of OS's becoming commonplace later on. If one empire for example controls most of the continent and is earning resources like mad then it'll be able to spam OS's all over the place, while the others can barely scrape enough together to keep pulling vehicles. There has to be at least a cooldown on them too.

KTNApollo · 2012-05-29, 08:37 AM

Originally Posted by Sirisian

I'd personally prefer a bomber loadout with a nuke though. The way orbital strikes worked in PS1 was extremely indirect.

This x1000. Orbital Strikes require 0 skill to use (yeah you have to be CR5, big deal), whereas a bomber could be shot down. I'd like to see a bomber with a nuke be implemented where you spawn a bomber at a tech plant, and immediately a warning comes up on the map so that the enemy can intercept and destroy the bomber. Would add more skill because you'd need a a fleet of fighters to help protect the bomber while it made its way to the drop zone.

Kran De Loy · 2012-05-29, 08:38 AM

Originally Posted by SpLiTNuTz

I can see the OS being right at the top of the command tree so that even if you did have multi characters it would take months to reach the unlock and probably have a few hours cool down.

That technically invalidate the 5 minute player being only 20% less than the 5 yr player. After 5 yrs many many people will have access to the OS while newer characters that have been playing for less than 1 or 2 months would have to spend ALL their time into specing into OS to get the OS. If the OS is as powerful as I believe it should be than of course they'll want to.

Personally my favorite combination of restrictions would be OS are rewarded to Outfits that do exceptionally well based on the number of people in the outfit to the number of resources they gather and the amount of work they put into capturing bases. Each outfit can will have a limited amount (more than one, less than 5) and they are put on a timer so they can not be earned OR used quickly. Also a low outfit member minimum.

This way Huge Zerg Outfits would be on equal footing with smaller tightly coordinated outfits and it would still allow that smaller casual outfits could still build up to get an OS every now and then while overall limiting the sheer number of OS.

Sledgecrushr · 2012-05-29, 08:46 AM

My vote is no on orbital strikes.

Xyntech · 2012-05-29, 08:58 AM

What if instead of having a cool down timer, the OS had a recharge timer.

You fire it off, and then it takes like 5 hours to charge back up. The catch would be that it would only continue charging as long as you met some certain criteria. Otherwise the recharge progress would be paused until you started actively meeting the criteria to charge it again.

Criteria could be something like:

- Earn 1000(?)xp per hour, to prove you are playing, not just idling
- Have at least one of the missions you give out per hour be successfully completed, to prove you're at the very least pretending to lead.
- You must be carrying the command tool (assuming such a thing exists in PS2), or else the recharge progress is paused.

At least it may cut down on the spam a little. Having it on a cool down timer just encourages you to use it ASAP to get some free kills so that it can recharge sooner so that you can get even more free kills. If you actually had to put some work into recharging it, you may end up being more interested in either keeping it in reserve, or not even bothering with the effort of recharging it.

What ever the criteria ended up being, it should be made so that it's relatively easy and painless (albeit time consuming) for an active leader to recharge their OS, while it should be annoying and a major grind for non leaders to try to charge one up.

Immigrant · 2012-05-29, 09:57 AM

Originally Posted by Sledgecrushr

My vote is no on orbital strikes.

I agree however:

Originally Posted by InfoThred

The orbital strike is making a return.

In a game like Planetside where all the roles are filled with real live players I find that breaking that element by introducing the "invisible men in the sky" firing the OS is kinda bad. p.s. I don't like those kind of guys in general.

However there could be an alternative that could solve few of the problem inherent to OS - Artillery Strike. Guy/or guys in actual artillery vehicles would have to wait for someone to call-in a strike and designate the location with laser and only then aim and fire at the target (if the person designating the spot dies before that they get into the position they couldn't fire anymore). This would solve the timer problem as well as the abuse by the newbs that can happen with OS. Also it would solve the problem with artillery since it could be countered by killing the guy designating the location. What do you think?

Kran De Loy · 2012-05-29, 10:32 AM

Originally Posted by Xyntech

What if instead of having a cool down timer, the OS had a recharge timer.

You fire it off, and then it takes like 5 hours to charge back up. The catch would be that it would only continue charging as long as you met some certain criteria. Otherwise the recharge progress would be paused until you started actively meeting the criteria to charge it again.

Criteria could be something like:

- Earn 1000(?)xp per hour, to prove you are playing, not just idling
- Have at least one of the missions you give out per hour be successfully completed, to prove you're at the very least pretending to lead.
- You must be carrying the command tool (assuming such a thing exists in PS2), or else the recharge progress is paused.

At least it may cut down on the spam a little. Having it on a cool down timer just encourages you to use it ASAP to get some free kills so that it can recharge sooner so that you can get even more free kills. If you actually had to put some work into recharging it, you may end up being more interested in either keeping it in reserve, or not even bothering with the effort of recharging it.

What ever the criteria ended up being, it should be made so that it's relatively easy and painless (albeit time consuming) for an active leader to recharge their OS, while it should be annoying and a major grind for non leaders to try to charge one up.

Hey, that's a great idea!

Originally Posted by Immigrant

I agree however:

In a game like Planetside where all the roles are filled with real live players I find that breaking that element by introducing the "invisible men in the sky" firing the OS is kinda bad. p.s. I don't like those kind of guys in general.

However there could be an alternative that could solve few of the problem inherent to OS - Artillery Strike. Guy/or guys in actual artillery vehicles would have to wait for someone to call-in a strike and designate the location with laser and only then aim and fire at the target (if the person designating the spot dies before that they get into the position they couldn't fire anymore). This would solve the timer problem as well as the abuse by the newbs that can happen with OS. Also it would solve the problem with artillery since it could be countered by killing the guy designating the location. What do you think?

It would suck to be the guy stuck in the Arty trucks.

Xaine · 2012-05-29, 10:51 AM

We're not sure how OS will work yet.

Matt said they had a plan for them, but haven't spoken about it yet.

I think there will be something more to it than just certing it.

Maybe something like the most effective commander(s), based on mission system success from the previous week or something.

Duddy · 2012-05-29, 11:03 AM

Originally Posted by Xaine

I think there will be something more to it than just certing it.

Maybe something like the most effective commander(s), based on mission system success from the previous week or something.

Honestly, with the new cert system I think it would be ill advised for it to be available to individual. In fact I am pretty certain it won't be.

As such I think that it is going to become an outfit "ability" instead that uses outfit resources (if such a thing exists) and also has a timer. This prevents everyone getting one and it also limits how many can potentially come down at any time.

Whilst you could argue you could have lots of smaller outfits to get more of them, if it is based off of an outfit resource having a smaller outfit would make it harder to earn enough to use one.

On the other side, a larger outfit wouldn't get you more because it would also be on a timer.

I sincerely hope the go for such an implementation, but more so I hope they add additional "abilites" outside of the OS to be used on such a system.

Sledgecrushr · 2012-05-29, 11:07 AM

My idea for orbital strikes, first off you would have to buy the ps2 orbital strike treadmill which would connect to your computer. Then to charge the orbital strike the person on the treadmill would have to run an average of six miles an hour for one hour to charge the orbital strike. And then the charge guy would be allowed to hit his iwin button and kill peeps ezmode in game.

Immigrant · 2012-05-29, 11:10 AM

Originally Posted by Sledgecrushr

My idea for orbital strikes, first off you would have to buy the ps2 orbital strike treadmill which would connect to your computer. Then to charge the orbital strike the person on the treadmill would have to run an average of six miles an hour for one hour to charge the orbital strike. And then the charge guy would be allowed to hit his iwin button and kill peeps ezmode in game.

Immigrant · 2012-05-29, 11:17 AM

Originally Posted by Kran De Loy

Hey, that's a great idea!

It would suck to be the guy stuck in the Arty trucks.

Small price to pay for free kills from far away; I would do it. Anyway if well coordinated with the guys on the frontline it shouldn't be that boring.

Anyway it's the only way I can think of to prevent spamming these kind of strikes. No matter how long it takes to charge up or what requirements are need people will stock them up (just 20 OS in a row will be more that enough to wipe everything out) and then we would see chaos unleashed every time before the major attack what would render base defenses like mines, deployable covers and turrets useless.

Hypevosa · 2012-05-29, 11:24 AM

I'd say a 1/continent/day limit would be good. Give people a reason to travel and all that.

Gandhi · 2012-05-29, 11:28 AM

Here's another idea. OS satellites have a limited number of uses, they have to be replaced after being fired X times. To replace one a special mission appears in the mission system, people who are certed for OS can pick up this mission which requires them to supply Y resources. After Z total resources are gathered from W players a new satellite is launched and each player who filled his "resource quota" is given an OS to use.

This makes it easy for SOE to influence the number of OS's on the battlefield simply by changing the availability of the missions.