It is as i feared... no deploy zones.

[SternLX]

Originally Posted by Chewy

Did he take advantage or adapt and over came?

(bad joke I know, but Heartbreak Ridge was a good movie and you walked right into that)

Didn't walk into anything considering I have never seen Heartbreak Ridge.

Also if you have nothing constructive to add keep it to yourself. I don't wanna hear it. Unlike Falcon_br who took the time to point out I missed the part in the Patch notes (that I missed on first read through) that No Deploy is only implemented on Indar and Amerish.

Thank you Falcon_br.

[NewSith]

No-Deploy zones on AMP Stations just allow for AMSes to be placed in proper locations of strategical value. Because all a Friendly AMS inside a V-Bay does is makes it hell of an effort to get anywhere in the courtyard and prevents other AMSes from deploying somewhere more convinient for the spawners.

That's in theory.

[Baneblade]

Come up with more creative places to put the defensive sunderer then. In my experience putting it in the obvious places just means it dies faster.

[Timithos]

Originally Posted by SternLX

Nott AMP Station no deploy is NOT working. You can still deploy an AMS Sundie inside the Shielded area. Just found that out the hard way. Pansy NC taking advantage of it.

Amp Station no-deploy zones are working, it's just that for some reason they placed a small 75-80 meter diameter zone centered between the main spawn room and the capture point. Attackers can deploy their sundy closer to the capture point then the defender's distance from their spawn room

[Timithos]

So I tried out the no-deploy zones yesterday and today. I was the attacker in my Sundy. I noticed on a few outposts that the zone was off center from the capture point. So I kept reporting it as a bug. Then I realized they did this on purpose by centering the zone midway between the spawn room and the capture point. Mind you that the no-deploy zone on non-major facilities is about 75-80 meters in diameter. What it allowed me to do was deploy my Sundy within 35 meters of the capture points, while the defender's spawn room was 70-100+ meters away. GAME OVER. Attacker wins.

Sunderer's generally are not the vehicles that camp spawn rooms. EVERY ELSE camps spawn rooms, while the sunderer provides a steady stream of infantry to camp the spawn room from a further, safe, concealed distance away. What sunderers more often are doing is getting as close to the capture point as possible, and on the opposite side of the spawn room (At least the intelligent sundy drivers do this.)

The no-deploy zones need to be centered on the capture point. If you really are concerned about this zone surrounding the spawn room, you can make a separate no-deploy zone even.

I'm disappointed that SOE made the no-deploy zones for defenders also. In my opinion this should have been only done for attackers in order to bring some semblance of meaning and defensibility to facility ownership. Defenders have had their advantages stripped away mainly since March mostly in the name of esport/MLG. Hopefully the Nexus will alleviate wrecked base design in the name of esports.

As it stands now, attackers can get their sundies much closer to the capture point at most facilities, even at an Amp Station. Game Over.

[Rivenshield]

It's like we got the old Sphere Of Influence back, but it's designed to fuck the defenders over...

[Stardouser]

attacking zerg forces have always been fully supported by short sighted base design...for outposts at least. Large facilities...you tell me, but outposts have always been designed to allow a few tanks or a bunch of infantry to camp the spawn room, and with engineers/vehicle regen, and medics, it's difficult for a small force to even inflict a single loss on the attackers.

[Greenthy]

Our outfit also can not see the clear benefit of having no deploy zones, other than making it very hard to get one in a decent spot. Bases just aren't designed for these no deploy zones. Some bases you can put one behind a building /rock in cover, others you have to leave them out in the open...
(with cover slighly away)

I don't see why we need this though. Breaking a hold on a facility was rewarding either on attacking or defending side with getting an AMS deployed/destroyed.

[Malorn]

For those that missed the hotfix notes a few days ago, the NDZs no longer affect defenders.

[DviddLeff]

Malorn, I presume that tying the no deploy zone to a generator was considered? Any reasons why it was not implemented - personally I think it would add some great depth to the game and more targets for squads.

[raw]

Originally Posted by DviddLeff

Malorn, I presume that tying the no deploy zone to a generator was considered? Any reasons why it was not implemented - personally I think it would add some great depth to the game and more targets for squads.

Everything should be tied to generators! On a more serious note I don't think that NDZs would make the best generatorable mechanic.

[Zadexin]

Originally Posted by raw

Everything should be tied to generators! On a more serious note I don't think that NDZs would make the best generatorable mechanic.

I agree, every defensive benefit should be tied to a generator. There needs to be MORE stuff to attack and defend than 2 generators and 1 point. We have 4 squads to a platoon, there should be at least 4 targets for a large station. And not all of them should be required to take down the facility. Because its still a five minute spawn camp wait after blowing up the SCU.

You could have one for no deploy zone, Have them for all the vehicle shields again (last time I played I could swear they were still missing at Dahaka), Have a generator for the tunnel gravity accelerators. And please god have a generator for the upcoming base shields!

[Malorn]

Originally Posted by DviddLeff

Malorn, I presume that tying the no deploy zone to a generator was considered? Any reasons why it was not implemented - personally I think it would add some great depth to the game and more targets for squads.

The purpose of the NDZs is to ensure timing between defender spawns and attacker spawns and prevent checkmate moves to capture a base by putting a spawn point directly on top of it or between the defender spawn and the capture point. Distance to travel from a spawn is a force multiplier and NDZs standardize it and give a clear defender advantage (which is why it doesn't affect defenders).

If we give the ability to disable the NDZ then we have three issues.
1) More places for a defender to defend, which makes it harder for them, especially if outnumbered.
2) If the NDZ is dropped, the fight is basically over since the attackers can now magnify their force even more. And if they managed to take out the generator then they probably already have more than the defender.
3) The ability for defenders to recover the situation is severely reduced, as now they not only have to secure the point and remove the AMS, but they must also retake the generator.

It's effectively more win for a winning side and a pure defender disadvantage to do that. By not having them removable we ensure consistency of spawn distance and give defenders better chances against a numerical superior opponent and better chances at recovering.

The fact that defenders can place AMS inside the NDZ means there's more objectives: For the attacker, the objective is kill the defensive AMS. For the defender the objective is to place them. Once those are gone the playing field from a spawn distance standpoint is even. Attackers have flexibility in spawn placement while defenders have the ability to fortify with closer spawns.

Generally speaking all of the NDZs should be roughly the distance from the defender spawn to the objective(s). They are custom to every outpost due to every outpost being different, so we may have some outposts that need tweaking if isn't quite right.

[Mordelicius]

Originally Posted by Malorn

The purpose of the NDZs is to ensure timing between defender spawns and attacker spawns and prevent checkmate moves to capture a base by putting a spawn point directly on top of it or between the defender spawn and the capture point. Distance to travel from a spawn is a force multiplier and NDZs standardize it and give a clear defender advantage (which is why it doesn't affect defenders).

If we give the ability to disable the NDZ then we have three issues.
1) More places for a defender to defend, which makes it harder for them, especially if outnumbered.
2) If the NDZ is dropped, the fight is basically over since the attackers can now magnify their force even more. And if they managed to take out the generator then they probably already have more than the defender.
3) The ability for defenders to recover the situation is severely reduced, as now they not only have to secure the point and remove the AMS, but they must also retake the generator.

It's effectively more win for a winning side and a pure defender disadvantage to do that. By not having them removable we ensure consistency of spawn distance and give defenders better chances against a numerical superior opponent and better chances at recovering.

The fact that defenders can place AMS inside the NDZ means there's more objectives: For the attacker, the objective is kill the defensive AMS. For the defender the objective is to place them. Once those are gone the playing field from a spawn distance standpoint is even. Attackers have flexibility in spawn placement while defenders have the ability to fortify with closer spawns.

Generally speaking all of the NDZs should be roughly the distance from the defender spawn to the objective(s). They are custom to every outpost due to every outpost being different, so we may have some outposts that need tweaking if isn't quite right.

Malorn, thx for posting. There are several problems with this line of logic:

1) There is a sort of false equivalency between the defender spawn and the attacker spawn. The defender spawn is invulnerable and (for the most part), allows players to shoot from within. The attacker spawn is very vulnerable and easy to take out. Hence if it blows, the action stops abruptly severely disrupting the battleflow.

Under a 1:1 combat strength ratio, spawn camping is not really a problem since the attackers have to look out for both the control points and the sunderer spawn, while the defenders only have to concentrate on the control points.

2) Sunderers can't simply be parked out in the open. The primary pressure for sundererer placement is not just proximity to the spawn but getting a good cover. The current base base designs doesn't provide enough of these covers.

If the Sundy has 10x the HP (just saying, not that they should have), then yes, they can be parked out there. But atm, park a Sundy exposed and it will go down so fast.

3) Under a 2:1 attacker:defender ratio, the spawn will be camped regardless, with air and tanks to boot. Just on Ti alloy alone, the south spawn door can be effectively locked down by Prowlers spamming HE from the SW ( I can already hear the Prowler spammers from Waterson chuckling )

The issue at hand is more of spawn camping and base design that is conducive to that spawn camping. Hence, trying to solve those with a NDZ is not the applicable approach.

The simplest solution to problems introduced by the NDZ, as we've been discussing before, is tying the generator the NDZ. I don't think the NDZ alleviates spawn camping. Spawn camping happens when attackers have the advantage of air, mechanized and foot soldier numbers (bombarding defending players with stacked DPS as they exit the spawn).

The best solution imo is the Jamming Sunderer. I obviously don't know if that can be implemented or feasible to the Devs but just throwing it out there.

My feedback from another thread:

Originally Posted by Mordelicius

Post your GU12 feedback.

Here's mine:

GU12 is easily the worst update they've ever concocted. It's pure gameplay interference. The Developer hands are where they shouldn't be. If there is a 4th faction, I'd call this 5th faction interference. Of course I'm talking about the


No Deploy Zone for Sunderer AMS - There are so many things to say about this that I don't know where to really start.

In basketball, I remember there was a 3-second rule where the defender can't camp under the basket if they aren't defending anyone. If they do, the ref will count to 3. If they are still there, they get a warning. Henceforth, on each and every iteration of this violation, the offense gets a freethrow. This No-deploy zone we got is permanent with no counter. You get the idea if that was implemented permanently in basketball.

On top of that, it's also a bad precedent (a tantamount to a slippery slope). The amount of community resistance they received didn't matter (watchout, they are trying to pass off a VS helmet as NS as well). All the reasoning in the world couldn't stop it. All the 2 votes against : 1 vote for ratio didn't count either. Another sad aspect is that they've been pushing this for months and yet they couldn't offer an iota of rationale thrust behind it: not a single word!

It's so bad that looking for the advantages out of it is like looking for the positives, of say, Malaria.

Planetside 2 is about massive combat on an epic scale, we've heard about it and it's all true up to now. This artificial 'mechanic' inhibits the potential of every single fight. I'm gonna fire off one by one the effects of this so far

Medium-Long Range Battles - Most of the fights have now degenerated to medium-long range fights. As i've predicted in previous threads, the defenders already know where the opposition is coming from. All they have to do is point their weapons in the general direction (especially in a tower). And with the base designs (lacking covers) and low TTK, it either bob up and shoot or charge and downright get massacred. And then the sunderer blows up. Which leads us to the next point:

Walk & Wipe - It's not just the size of the No-deploy zone is bad, its' the lack of cover. Sunderers end up in the most awkward places far away from the points. This is especially true in tower fights. Two days ago, we wiped 3 times on the tower, I just logged out in disgust. There's nowhere to put the sunderers: either put it in an exposed building and repair spam or stash it away in a faraway cover.

Anytime we even get close to getting two points, the Sunderers will explode and the whole frontline will collapse in a complete failure cascade (the attacker will then regroup in tedium while the defenders wait in boredom repeating this cycle ad nauseum) Again, this point leads us to:

Shortened Battles - The battles are much shorter now. The long, protracted meatgrinder fights are gone. I call these zones the no-fun zone. No good fights ever come out of it. (I've also read, they are shortening the cap times in PTS, so this probably part of a new PS2 theme).

The other day, the Vanu were so confident they will take Peris amp station during an alert (outnumbering us at least 2:1), that they've been talking trash. They took A point and was sure to capture the base when we got reinforcements. Just like that in one single push, they wiped on A. And as a movie director would say "Cut!", the action stops, almost eerily. We moved to the walls, while they try to push in new sunderers from the tower satellite to no avail, it was already over. It's all easy pickings. The battles are turning to Wack-a-Sundy. This point finally lead us to

Battleflow Disruption - combine all that and you got a very uneven battleflow. Walking, Medium/Long range shoot outs, Sundy hunting/defending, Wiping, regroup tediously. Repeat the short fights cycle.

For a game that prides itself on epic, large-scale battles this is not a step backward but a tumble one floor downward. This limited the gameplay potential by that much. All the creative things event that players do or happen under zone has been restricted. Remember the suicide Sundies (storming in out of nowhere) that has about 15% chance of sticking/deploaying under heavy fire, you won't see that anymore. All the unpredictable stuff that can happen, an anything goes feeling is gone. And it's as predicted on my previous posts about this. All those potential, exciting things that can happen without the No-deploy zone are all gone.

The Developers should be giving us tools to fight each other. Not unnecessary, unwanted, unrewarding mechanics that restricts us from fighting, by limiting combat scenarios. I honestly don't believe the Developers play their own game enough. If they did, they won't even consider implementing this, much less bulldoze it through much community resistance (They ought to just discontinue the Roadmap program. It's just a source of pain for both sides. It promulgates lofty expectations, and player feedback over there are worthless and wasted when they simply overrule on a whim).

They could have given us Jamming Sunderers that actually do the same thing but actually can be interacted with by the players while giving the clashes more depth.

MLG related? - I've thought and thought what could be the driving force behind this. Initially, I figured it was to prevent spawn camping. But then again, in an even 1:1 fight, the attacker is disadvantaged because, defense spawn point is invulnerable and players can shoot out of it, while a Sundy/Spawn beacon can easily be destroyed. In a 2:1 fight, will it make much of a difference? No, the current base designs naturally conduce spawn camping, so it's unavoidable.

So what could it be the reasoning behind this? Since, the Developers have been mum about it for months and from the beginning, and basically offering nothing (I know they will say 'they don't have to'. Fine), i'll just go and guess then.

The closest thing I've come up is that this is MLG related. I'm really anxious to see the Battle Islands. First thing, i'll do is get a Sunderer and check all the no-deploy zones and check if it's perfectly calibrated to the surroundings and base designs. In a 48 vs 48 with many bases, i'd imagine a Sunderer parked too close will be advantageous to the attacker. There would be a shortage of players and there won't be enough DPS to take it down. Whereas in the live, continental servers, there is a much higher player limit, and DPS isn't an issue.

As a final summary this no-deploy 'mechanic' is a self-inflicted wound for PS2. They've literally garroted their own advantages and what separates them from the pack.

Some posts about the No Deploy Zones before it was rammed through with poor consideration:

http://www.planetside-universe.com/s...t=55611&page=2
http://www.planetside-universe.com/s...t=55611&page=4
http://www.planetside-universe.com/s...ad.php?t=53073

[Baneblade]

Originally Posted by Malorn

The purpose of the NDZs is to ensure timing between defender spawns and attacker spawns and prevent checkmate moves to capture a base by putting a spawn point directly on top of it or between the defender spawn and the capture point. Distance to travel from a spawn is a force multiplier and NDZs standardize it and give a clear defender advantage (which is why it doesn't affect defenders).

If we give the ability to disable the NDZ then we have three issues.
1) More places for a defender to defend, which makes it harder for them, especially if outnumbered.
2) If the NDZ is dropped, the fight is basically over since the attackers can now magnify their force even more. And if they managed to take out the generator then they probably already have more than the defender.
3) The ability for defenders to recover the situation is severely reduced, as now they not only have to secure the point and remove the AMS, but they must also retake the generator.

It's effectively more win for a winning side and a pure defender disadvantage to do that. By not having them removable we ensure consistency of spawn distance and give defenders better chances against a numerical superior opponent and better chances at recovering.

The fact that defenders can place AMS inside the NDZ means there's more objectives: For the attacker, the objective is kill the defensive AMS. For the defender the objective is to place them. Once those are gone the playing field from a spawn distance standpoint is even. Attackers have flexibility in spawn placement while defenders have the ability to fortify with closer spawns.

Generally speaking all of the NDZs should be roughly the distance from the defender spawn to the objective(s). They are custom to every outpost due to every outpost being different, so we may have some outposts that need tweaking if isn't quite right.

Why is increasing the spawn time on Sunderers not on the table?