Vehicle disabling

[Stardouser]

Originally Posted by elfailo

Don't take it personal, I just think it's a terrible idea by itself, regardless the context in which it's proposed or by whom.

It's not the first time I see it and it won't be the last. Many players already whined about the power of vehicles when Planetside had just released. Some even wanted RPG's that could insta-kill Vanguards (not even joking here).

I'm not sure if you're talking to me, but I am not proposing disabling, I am proposing that we NOT have disabling. Disabling IS a terrible idea, indeed.

[Fenrod]

Damn, I think we keep going round in circles there. Like Destroyeron said, there is no need for it.

[Stardouser]

Originally Posted by elfailo

I was. You started a poll, I voted, then explained my vote. Didn't want you to think that I thought you were pro-disabled vehicles, hence the reply. Should have made it more clear initially.

I think it's bad in general (any kind of, even what Xyntech proposes) because all it will do is prevent turning the tables at low health, which can be some of the most fun scenario's. If it's 25% where you get disabled, you will be a sitting duck, and you'll have an even harder time escaping.

Imagine a battle where 2 Magriders try to kill 1 Vanguard. The Vanguard team takes out 1 Magrider and is left with 50% armor. Then it receives 2 lucky shots and is reduced to a crawl at 25%, or even loses control completely. It becomes a sitting duck and the bad Magrider team gets to finish them off easily and drive away alive. It would be a reward for bad driving & shooting where otherwise the Vanguard team could have easily won.

I agree with you, the problem with BF3 is that they are seeking to cater to infantry with disabling. Many of BF3's new target audience players(and some of the old guard from BF2) refuse to take, for example, the tank, and to go try and kill the enemy tank. Often, they simply leave each other alone, and concentrate on raping infantry for points. And so DICE ruins the vehicle vs vehicle combat by making the game to where infantry can stand toe to toe with vehicles. And that philosophy is not one I would like to see repeated...

[Xyntech]

Originally Posted by elfailo

Imagine a battle where 2 Magriders try to kill 1 Vanguard. The Vanguard team takes out 1 Magrider and is left with 50% armor. Then it receives 2 lucky shots and is reduced to a crawl at 25%, or even loses control completely. It becomes a sitting duck and the bad Magrider team gets to finish them off easily and drive away alive. It would be a reward for bad driving & shooting where otherwise the Vanguard team could have easily won.

The only way the idea would work is if everyone, both players and developers, stopped thinking of the sub-optimally functioning or fully disabled portion as part of the standard health bar.

If a tank has 8000 health, it shouldn't lose 4000 and then suck, it should lose 8000 and then, if disabling is included, have 2000 more health (or whatever amount) but be next to useless in a fight.

With infantry, we lose all of our health, then we suddenly keel over. Then a medic can come along and revive us, and we are back in the fight. The idea for vehicles I was talking about would essentially be like being able to revive that vehicle, except that the enemy also has a chance to finish the vehicle off.

That's why my initial idea was that it be a completely different health bar if your vehicle became disabled, but just having a marked spot on the health bar would be fine as long as only the main part of the health bar was considered when talking about how much base health a vehicle had, because once that health was gone the vehicle would at least temporarily be out of the fight.

What I'm essentially saying is that being disabled could be exactly the same as being destroyed, with the caveat that the vehicle can still be repaired, or the enemy can fire another shot or two and finish the job.

Let me rephrase your quote from above with vehicles getting destroyed instead of disabled once their health runs out:

'Imagine a battle where 2 Magriders try to kill 1 Vanguard. The Vanguard team takes out 1 Magrider and is left with 66% armor. Then it receives 2 lucky shots and is destroyed. It becomes dead and the bad Magrider team gets to win and drive away alive. It would be a reward for bad driving & shooting where otherwise the Vanguard team could have easily won.'

Why two Magriders beating a Vanguard is bad, I have no clue.

I totally agree that suddenly reducing effectiveness drastically at 50% health is retarded, but slowly reducing effectiveness once the vehicle gets below 25% health, or suddenly rendering the vehicle inoperable at something like 5% or 10% health wouldn't be that big a deal. All it would do is provide another option for a tank crew to potentially survive and get back in the fight.

As much as people talk about enjoying those PS1 moments where they would get away with 1hp left, only to repair and fight another day, I'm sure that there would be plenty of people in PS2 with great stories of their tank being disabled and their team mates tank finishing off the last enemy just in time so that they could repair and rejoin the fight. Hell, there would still be room for the PS1 style situation, where you had 1hp left before you were disabled.

Again, I think that keeping it PS1 style where you just run out of health and blow up would be fine, but I'm just not seeing where some form of disabling would absolutely be a terrible thing no matter how it was done.

[metziih]

I don't like the idea of losing hitpoints over time just because my tank survived through the battle with 40% health left. Wouldn't it just encourage me to do a suicide run since there is no way I can get my tank fixed quickly enough?

(If I could decide, I would have complicated damage models for tanks. Kinda like in Battleground Europe / WW2 Online. Except for lol-crew/pilot-death which I did not like to be honest.)

[Immigrant]

I'm against "burning" feature (losing HP over time)... but I support idea that either effectiveness of guns gets downgraded and/or some advanced/non-essential options get shut down when HP gets lower than 20-25%. That would make engineer class more valuable and give another reason that would promote repair of the vehicles even more that the others that exist now.

[Xyntech]

Originally Posted by elfailo

If the idea you're proposing includes still being able to fire while disabled, then I agree that it would even be better unless the before mentioned ratio is all skewed.

That could be interesting. Vehicles are no longer able to move at 10% health, but can still fire their gun until they are destroyed. Jammers prevent guns from firing, but still let the vehicle drive away.

Sort of a best of both worlds type of a thing. Still leaves you a sitting duck if you take enough damage, but with an option to defend yourself a little, or perhaps get the killing blow on the final enemy so that you can get out and safely repair your vehicle.

I think we can all agree that it should not follow battlefields example on the matter though.

[TOCS]

No, it's the stupidest addition to vehicle immersion in games I've ever seen.

[SGTalon]

I have thought about this before.

I would love to see this as more of a simulator. Armor already has locational damage. Hit it in the back and it goes down faster and stuff like that.

What if it was something like Mechwarrior or the old Starfleet Battles:

- All Damage goes to locational armor until it penetrates.
- Once armor is penetrated, damage starts going to systems in that area.

With this type of system you could take a hits to the turret that disables just the turret but motion is unaffected. Similarly, damage to the engine reduces power, damage to the tracks reduces turning ability and speed, damage to the front/cockpit area affects targetting and information systems.

On top of this, repairs by mechanics would be locational. You have a damaged engine, you have to work on it from the back. as evidenced by visual damage and smoking/ mechanic hud overlays that show where the damage is.

It seems like it would be a logical extension of the locational damage that is already in the game. And it would add much more to the realism and awesomeness of the game.

Sure in a firefight, this type of thing could be rough but i think it would also help to hone the skills and expertise of the players.

We do want this game to be the most awesome game in the history of PC gaming right?

[PlaceboCyanide]

After thinking about it more - I changed my mind from my initial vote. Vehicles becoming disabled every single time before dying is kind of silly and only promotes the reckless rambo play. At the same time, what always broke immersion for me in previous games was a large tank being taken out by a SMG or other small arms fire. If the vehicle health were to drop to 0hp but it was dealt from a small arms weapon it shouldn't flat out kill it. Feels like a fair compromise to me that adds a bit of flavor to the game.

EDIT:

Originally Posted by SGTalon

- All Damage goes to locational armor until it penetrates.
- Once armor is penetrated, damage starts going to systems in that area.

With this type of system you could take a hits to the turret that disables just the turret but motion is unaffected. Similarly, damage to the engine reduces power, damage to the tracks reduces turning ability and speed, damage to the front/cockpit area affects targetting and information systems.

Red Orchestra 2: Heroes of Stalingrad had something similar to this. if you used the Anti-Tank rifle in just the right way you could disable a Panzer IV's ability to: use brakes, use tracks, turn and/or fire their main gun, as well as disable the MG. It was an amazing mechanic, but many problems with the game made the game as a whole pretty terribad. I think as far as immersion and realism goes, having that sort of thing in a game would be incredible -- but it might also discourage and frustrate a lot of people. We don't (well, I don't at least) know how hard this would be to implement or how much it would tax the MMO aspect of PS2.

[headcrab13]

It's kind of silly to have a vehicle become disabled when it gets shot up too much.

The most realistic solution would be once your vehicle takes 5% or more damage, it bursts into flames and quickly burns down from 95%. Upon reaching 0% integrity, it transforms into a mega-BFR and rises from the ashes to crush all of your attackers while you watch from the bushes.

[Noivad]

I voted no because what BF3 does to its tanks is not realistic. But if PS2 took on the properties of World Of Tanks, where the gunner actually needs to use skill to kill another tank as well as tactics then damage to a tank would be acceptable. There are 16 different hit points on a WOT tank, and depending where you hit the tank, it gives different damage types. WOT is FTP so see what you think about it.

I would like to see PS2 have more then one tank type if possible. Light, medium, Heavy, Tank Destroyer, AWSP, Automated Weapon Self propeled, SPG, Self preled gun as in Arty. That would give a more Dynamic feel to the Battle field, would promote even more team work amongest Tanker types and overall be what I like most - realism.

Why should a game as big as PS2 not have the realism of a modern battle field today, in the future of PS2?

[Ejaz]

It doesn't need ground vehicle disabling, You are constantly on the move to defend or attack a base. Just IMO.

[SGTalon]

Here is another thing to think about.

How realistic is it that a tank can be running around at 1 hp at full capability and the next time it is hit with a little tiny bit of splash damage it explodes, killing everyone in the tank.

I think back to all the awesome vehicle and ship battle stories i have ever seen or read. You are struggling to manage damage on your vehicle, protecting your damaged side, desperately trying to take out your opponent or at least weaken him enough that you can get off some desperately needed repairs. Systems are going down with every hit, and finally you get off that critical turret hit that means that your enemy can't shoot you anymore. Your engineer quickly jumps out and repairs your drive system, you run back into range and blast the bad guy into tiny pieces, saving your entire faction from sure destruction.

[Talek Krell]

I'm pretty much with Xyntech and crew on this one. I don't hate the idea of having a vehicle be disabled, and it would make for some great Planetside moments when you manage to piece your tank back together in the middle of a firefight to finish an opponent that had dismissed you as done. At the same time though the BF3 model sounds stupidly restrictive, and a tank shouldn't start to malfunction until it's almost cooked anyway.

+1 to the idea of locational repairs. I think I like that.