So is the Prowler going to suck like it did in PS1?

[EVILPIG]

Originally Posted by Malorn

Also as numbers increase it is alpha-strike, not dps, that matters.

Case in point, in EVE Goonswarm changed their standard fleet ship to the Malestrom and rigged it for maximum alpha strike damage and passive tanking. In a large enough number, those Maelstroms could one-shot a ship and greatly increase the efficiency of a fleet battle.

And for context, the Maelstrom's design is effectively that of the Vanguard - high damage, low rate of fire and overall low dps. But when you have a lot of them all firing at the same target, rate of fire becomes irrelevant because it only takes one volley to destroy a ship. They'd call targets, and each person fired one volley, then moved to the next target. They knew by sheer numbers that one volley per person in the fleet was enough to destroy almost any ship.

Same is true with large tank battles in PS. If a group of vanguards can drop a prowler in one-2 volleys then rate of fire really becomes irrelevant and Alpha Strike vs Effective Hitpoints becomes the factor, both of which are strenghts of the Vanguard in PS1 and PS2.

As the numbers increase dps becomes less relevant as alpha strike becomes king, but accuracy is his queen.


So again, as things scale upwards, it is the Vanguard that gets the most benefit, especially if the prowler has weaker armor. That just means it requires fewer vanguards to achieve the critical mass for 1-shot or 2-shotting tanks.

Alpha strike goes out the window when you look at the RoF. Ya, sure, the Vanguard starts a little ahead, but that is quickly overcome. It's not like we're talking about 10 seconds between shots, where you could find cover. The DPS is covered over the 20 seconds of the Vanny and Prowler's clips. I had a nice chart of it but just as I would like to have pulled old threads for others on here, the search function on the official boards doesn't work anymore and I'm not digging through 50 pages to find them.

But, LMAO at what this thread has become. Wait for Beta and don't pre-panic.

[Skitrel]

Originally Posted by Malorn

Also as numbers increase it is alpha-strike, not dps, that matters.

Case in point, in EVE Goonswarm changed their standard fleet ship to the Malestrom and rigged it for maximum alpha strike damage and passive tanking. In a large enough number, those Maelstroms could one-shot a ship and greatly increase the efficiency of a fleet battle.

And for context, the Maelstrom's design is effectively that of the Vanguard - high damage, low rate of fire and overall low dps. But when you have a lot of them all firing at the same target, rate of fire becomes irrelevant because it only takes one volley to destroy a ship. They'd call targets, and each person fired one volley, then moved to the next target. They knew by sheer numbers that one volley per person in the fleet was enough to destroy almost any ship.

Same is true with large tank battles in PS. If a group of vanguards can drop a prowler in one-2 volleys then rate of fire really becomes irrelevant and Alpha Strike vs Effective Hitpoints becomes the factor, both of which are strenghts of the Vanguard in PS1 and PS2.

As the numbers increase dps becomes less relevant as alpha strike becomes king, but accuracy is his queen.


So again, as things scale upwards, it is the Vanguard that gets the most benefit, especially if the prowler has weaker armor. That just means it requires fewer vanguards to achieve the critical mass for 1-shot or 2-shotting tanks.

Thank you Malorn. This is what I was getting at, though didn't know the technical term for.

[BuzzCutPsycho]

Originally Posted by Malorn

Also as numbers increase it is alpha-strike, not dps, that matters.

Case in point, in EVE Goonswarm changed their standard fleet ship to the Malestrom and rigged it for maximum alpha strike damage and passive tanking. In a large enough number, those Maelstroms could one-shot a ship and greatly increase the efficiency of a fleet battle.

And for context, the Maelstrom's design is effectively that of the Vanguard - high damage, low rate of fire and overall low dps. But when you have a lot of them all firing at the same target, rate of fire becomes irrelevant because it only takes one volley to destroy a ship. They'd call targets, and each person fired one volley, then moved to the next target. They knew by sheer numbers that one volley per person in the fleet was enough to destroy almost any ship.

Same is true with large tank battles in PS. If a group of vanguards can drop a prowler in one-2 volleys then rate of fire really becomes irrelevant and Alpha Strike vs Effective Hitpoints becomes the factor, both of which are strenghts of the Vanguard in PS1 and PS2.

As the numbers increase dps becomes less relevant as alpha strike becomes king, but accuracy is his queen.


So again, as things scale upwards, it is the Vanguard that gets the most benefit, especially if the prowler has weaker armor. That just means it requires fewer vanguards to achieve the critical mass for 1-shot or 2-shotting tanks.

Don't waste your breath because it's obvious that Figment doesn't know shit from Shinola.

[Hamma]

Let's go ahead and try to have a bit more discussion about the OP's topic and a little less E-Penis wagging and personal attacks. Disagreements are inevitable when debating a topic if you find yourself beginning to attack someone's credibility rather than debate the topic at hand go ahead and utilize the ignore feature instead.

It doesn't benefit the devs to have to wade through 10 pages of arguments that barely touch on the original topic.

[Malorn]

Well most of the posts have been on topic. I'll bring it back around with this post.


Key questions for the devs:

1) Is the prowler a 3-man tank again?

Background for this question is that we were told early on that the Prowler was a 2-man tank, but then a few months ago Higby mentioned in the faction webcast that the TR weapons and vehicles would require more players to operate. I tweeted Higby with this question but he seems more interested in "rah rah NC rah rah" than legitimate concerns.

2) What is the design direction for the prowler? What is it intended to be really good at compared to the other tanks?

In PS1 when compared to the magrider and vanguard, the prowler came up short. Magrider and Vangaurd each excel with the Mag being a maneuverable, very precise tank while the vanguard was an all-around solid and versatile tank. Meanwhile the prowler had the highest dps but that was the extent of its value, and as the Magrider shows, dps and TTK are not what really matters. Versatility with the prowler and its other benefits are a key concern.

We have heard very little of this tank and seen very few images of it let alone real information. Lots about the mag and vanguard though. So hopefully the devs can inject some more TR love and show off what's really awesome about the prowler that it excels at compared to the other tanks.

tl;dr: moar prowler infos please, tell us why it is awesome

[Hamma]

I agree with your thoughts - I just attempted to Tweet at Higby asking whether or not it's a 3 man again. Keep your fingers crossed

[Figment]

@Malorn: Again, I understand your position on Alpha Strike and it can definitely determine who wins in an encounter, but that's primarily true for large Damage per Shot differences with little rof differences (meaning a lot of alpha strike damage can be repeated on short notice) and very dependent on context.

If you think KV-2 with 152 or 107mm vs M4 or PzIV in World of Tanks then that does not have to be the case. KV has a lot of armour for its tier, the firepower advantage by far per shot, but is slow, inaccurate and has a low rate of fire and turning speed and reload therefore hinders it tremendously in being effective. However, since the terrain limits maneuvring and tanks tend to stand still to minimise the cof, it becomes a very strong tank.

The M4 though is a spammer, agile and snipy. The PzIV is somewhere in the middle, but more towards the M4 in built. These can utterly circle or snipe a KV-2 to death though. All three require a different playstyle and different marksmanship.

Playstyle alone is not enough to determine the outcome though, context is extremely important as indicated before. How much that playstyle is catered to by the map through possible approach routes and maneuvring space, as well as player quality (aim) and of course who actually spots the enemy determines who wins such encounters. Alpha Strike does therefore not need to be that important if you can't deliver it adequately. (iirc, EVE has automatic aim and almost always the same, wide open context, right? So that's far less prone to efficiency issues).

So lets go back to PS2...

The PS2 Prowler seems a more open field and flanking tank and the PS2 Magrider more suited to canyons and either very open, long range or very confined spaces. PS2 Vanguard will probably work best in ambushes and semi-confined space.

Context is probably going to be decisive which of these ends on top, if the terrain is too cramped, the Prowler will probably suffer most from it. A fast medium tank in an open field has a huge advantage, if driven well though, but once trapped it will die fast. The off-center turret will be something to get used to on the Prowler. Still, I'd say the VS tanks will require most skill to drive and survive, based on being a semi-TD and being a less stable, floating platform that's vulnerable to outmaneuvring at melee ranges.

[Malorn]

Sorry Figment, I am not all that familiar with World of Tanks beyond their business model.

As for PS2, I agree context matters, and I would very much like to know what context the Prowler is intended to excel at. I'd also like to know if the PS2 prowler was balanced based on 2 or 3 man crew. In general we haven't heard much about this tank.

Mag and Vanguard have pretty well-defined roles, but the Prowler just seems to be the odd man out without a clear context in which it would excel. Perhaps it is intended to be a flanker? (Buzz mentioned this earlier), the speed and high DPS allude to that. We just don't really know very much about it to make any conclusions.

Maybe my title of this thread was a little harsh but it got the attention of people and hopefully it leads to some more design insight on the Prowler and what it excels at in PS2.

[Hamma]

Via Twitter right now it is a two man tank. Higby and team have toyed around with making all empires 3 man to have a dedicated drive but it's nothing final.

https://twitter.com/#!/BrewkoPS/stat...36207570333696

@CDLHamma @mhigby The Prowler is a 2-man tank in #PlanetSide2.

@CDLHamma We're still determining if we'll have a 3rd slot on the MBTs, it's a possibility at this point.

I asked:

@BrewkoPS @mhigby thanks brewko I'd assume what Matt mentioned would go for all tanks if it happened

The response:

@CDLHamma @BrewkoPS probably. It's something @kevmo0 and I discussed POSSIBLY adding as a way to spec tanks out to have a dedicated driver

So it is not in stone but it is something they have thought of.

Possibly new thread worthy?

[EVILPIG]

Originally Posted by Malorn

Sorry Figment, I am not all that familiar with World of Tanks beyond their business model.

As for PS2, I agree context matters, and I would very much like to know what context the Prowler is intended to excel at. I'd also like to know if the PS2 prowler was balanced based on 2 or 3 man crew. In general we haven't heard much about this tank.

Mag and Vanguard have pretty well-defined roles, but the Prowler just seems to be the odd man out without a clear context in which it would excel. Perhaps it is intended to be a flanker? (Buzz mentioned this earlier), the speed and high DPS allude to that. We just don't really know very much about it to make any conclusions.

Maybe my title of this thread was a little harsh but it got the attention of people and hopefully it leads to some more design insight on the Prowler and what it excels at in PS2.

Malorn, my statement about your credibility was as outrageous as yours about the Prowler, so I guess you got my point as well. As I said earlier, you put up some intelligent arguments. I was just shocked to see you say such a thing.

[MonsterBone]

The Prowler was better then the vanguard, period. Its main gun was more powerful. The extra gunner on the Prowler was anit-air.

And thats the whole point PS2 is going to be noob heavy with air to ground loadouts. The third gunner in every tank NEEDS to be anti air.

[MonsterBone]

Oh god I just reread the tweets....

There needs to be more anti air guns on the battlefield. But it sounds like Higs just wants to add a person but make him the driver only.

That means taking the main cannon away from the driver, how are noobs supposed to stick the cannon in a door like that?

[Aurmanite]

Originally Posted by Firefly

Gonna have to say that Firefly did exactly two things during Planetside: play the game, and follow the leaderboards as well as outfit listings in-game by outfit points and number of people. I'm a stat-whore with a fairly great memory. What's funny is that I could tell you just about every single outfit that sat in the top twenty percent on VS, NC, and TR on Emerald and Markov from retail launch day to about 2007, which comes out to be over a hundred outfits. And I'm terribly sorry that I've never heard of your outfit. So, you can posture all you like. Don't take that as an insult, because apparently you are very defensive about it. I've just never heard of you or your outfit.


Considering you couldn't even get a simple piece of well-known Planetside notoriety right, I'm going to have to say that no, no it doesn't. And all of your forum board-warrioring about how this thread is full of ample evidence about how the Prowler was the best tank EVAR is hollow, social gaffe notwithstanding. You have multiple TR and multiple NC veterans telling you that it was not. You can type a bunch of fucking numbers in here all you like, like "Jimmy bought fifty Prowlers and Johnny bought thirty, how many do they have together?" and it doesn't make a damned bit of difference.

The Prowler sucked. Like people have said - there were no well-known Prowler-pulling units. All the big-name TR outfits focused on either mossie-bailing or Galaxy air assaults.

It's a time warp.

If you took the time to read my posts in this thread, since page one, it's really clear that I'm not trying to convince anyone that the Prowler is the best tank...ev-er. In fact I agree that it's the worst of the three. You ended up piling on with the over aggressive nerd rage crowd in an argument that didn't exist.

As for the outfit tip, you missed so many words in this thread that I have a hard time banking on your memory of 7-9 years ago. In the end it doesn't matter if you 'know who I am, bro.' I know what I was doing back in the day, you know what you were doing, and neither one of us give half a fuck about the other.

I'm sorry to Enclave members for mistaking Konreid as a Euro server. Shit happens, know what I'm saying? Hopefully your e-go's aren't too bruised because I made that mistake. People know who you are.

Some of the posters are comfortable summing up the strengths of VS/NC tanks with words like "maneuverable" or "well rounded", but can't find that same comfort with words like "damage" or "versatile". Why? These words aren't suitable for describing a tank and it's niche in a game?

It makes sense that the Prowler MKII is going to be the fastest tank, the focus on speed just fits the empire. It looks like it will not be a 3 man tank which is fantastic. If it's the worst tank in Planetside 2 I won't be too upset, so long as it's only the marginally bit weaker than it was in the original.

[Skitrel]

Originally Posted by Higby

That Prowler thread is brutal man... people are temperamental lately eh?

http://twitter.com/#!/mhigby/status/180839606512660480

Yes.

[Malorn]

Originally Posted by Hamma

PRAISE JESUS!!!!

And also Praise Brewko for the answer. Thank you Brewko!

If there's anything else you can divulge about the prowler's intended role that would be awesome. You are one of the few advocates of the Republic, so muscle those guys into talking about more than just the VS and NC.