Vehicles, AV weapons, and the role of Infantry

[Teek]

I'm not going to write a huge post here, just want to put up a few thoughts I had when I played PS, and what I think would be good ideas for PSN.

When someone says Planetside to me, I think two things: 1. One of my favorite games, and 2. OMG there was a lot of vehicles.

Now, don't get me wrong, I love vehicles. I think they're missing from a lot of games these days, and that some of my favorite fps games, Halo, Planetside, and Battlefield, all had vehicles.

But the difference between the games I just mentioned are how vehicles are implemented. In the BF and halo games, vehicles are collectively spawned at a controlled rate and are valuable assets to the team. In Planetside, however, players spawn their own vehicles, which can be fun, but can also cause some problems. Now, FYI, I'm not saying the spawn system should change to that of BF or halo. This is Planetside, I wouldn't want that kind of mechanic to change that much. However, I do think vehicles were, for the most part, overpowered in this game, and that even among vehicles themselves the balance was often out of whack.

Firstly, I think tweaks could be made to how we spawn vehicles. In Planetside, we were cursed by an abundance of vehicles. I literally could get a tank, drive around a bit, get blown up, and by the time I respawn and get to a vehicle terminal, I would quite often be able to get the same tank again, or something similar. Tanks were far more popular than any other vehicle, given that they were the most powerful but also still fairly easy to get. There doesn't really seem to be a downside to getting a tank, other than that if you are the driver, you might not be able to gun (unless you used the lightning.) I've heard other players bemoan the lack of usage of ground vehicles, like the buggies, and I specifically cannot remember seeing very many ground transports either.

This goes into my second point: infantry were grossly outclassed by tanks and other vehicles. AV weapons would take dozens of shots to bring down a main tank, and you rarely lived long enough to get that many shots. To beat a tank, you either needed to bring a lot of rocket launchers, or your own tanks (or a reaver.) Naturally, it usually made more sense just to get a tank, since it was so powerful and didn't require you coordinating several squads of guys just to take out one target. Because it was better for infantry to be in tanks than out, you only used infantry in the last phases of base and tower assaults, or in specialty roles like sniping. If my theory is true, than its no wonder that we didn't use many ground transports: either they were replaced by using air cav to get around, or most troops were in tanks.

In closing, I want to emphasize that I don't feel we should excessively remove vehicles from the game, nor remove the system of individual vehicle purchase. However, I think we should either
a) nerf vehicles, buff AV weapons, or strengthen transports, or maybe a combination of the above. Strengthen the role of infantry in ground combat apart from just getting out of vehicles to fight inside a base, or repairing tanks.
b) make vehicles less common. Maybe increase spawn times, or make it take more resources to get vehicles. Maybe increase cert requirements of many of the heavier tanks. Just try to make it so that vehicles have more value, rather than there just being tons of easy to get heavy tanks.

My greatest wish for Planetside Next would be to expand viable play styles. Vehicles should feel powerful in the game, but they shouldn't be so central to gameplay. Infantry should also be viable in combat, and should be worth transporting around, both in air and on the ground.

[PsychoXR-20]

I don't agree that vehicles were overpowered, I felt they were just right. The vehicles in BF2142 (the closest game IMO to PS) had some OP vehicles. The mechs in BF seemed grossly imbalanced, even grabbing the engineer class (I think that's the one with the AV weapon) I could never kill on of those things.

You mentioned vehicles versus infantry. I really don't believe that infantry should be on equal footing, or even close. Vehicles should be stronger than a foot soldier, and only a very, very, very, very, skilled player should be able to go toe-to-toe with a tank and win, and only in the most ideal situations (say in a courtyard where the infantry can stay up on the base walls where the tank can't reach him). It SHOULD take 3-4 well coordinated infantry to take down a tank, otherwise what would be the point in having vehicles?

do agree with the spawn timer. Good players can forget there even is one. I would buff all vehicle timers to 10 minutes minimum, and not have the timer start until the original vehicle is destroyed.

[Bags]

I rarely have problems with vehicles on my BR27/CR5 that I mostly grunt / hot drop with. Some of my best K/Ds have come from MA battles with lots of vehicles. Jammers and trees are your friends.

[CutterJohn]

I don't think much needs to be done other than making the tanks by far the best vehicle out there. Those really were the most horribly OP vehicles when it came to dealing with infantry.

You don't want to buff infantry AV much, if at all though. This is still a team game, and half the issue with ESAV was nobody used it right, which was a fault of people not practicing teamwork, and poor distribution of rewards. A dug in ESAV team was insane. a squad of lancers would just annihilate vehicles, and with the indestructible terrain, could be impossible to kill by those same vehicles. I've done this before, in outfit ops. Its just crazy what focus fire AV can accomplish.

[Warborn]

Infantry should have been the primary method of killing enemy infantry and, obviously, taking bases and towers. Vehicles should have had more specific niches, with more emphasis given on fighting other vehicles. From there, infantry AV probably could have been reduced... maybe. I'm not sure on that. Either way, it was a bit silly that basically every vehicle designed to fight ground targets was focused on killing infantry. They all competed with each other, and as such in a lot of cases vehicles were obsolete in most situations, or all situations, simply because they couldn't kill infantry anywhere close to others.

Using rock-paper-scissors is overly simplistic, but the general idea works. More variety in vehicles and their niches, with more vehicles being designed to counter certain other types of vehicles and not everything being good at killing infantry.

[DviddLeff]

As a Mag driver if I run into 4+ infantry we are screwed especially if they have any cover. If I had an instagib main cannon that would be different however.

Infantry vs vehicles is fine overall; but infantry need more cover to make use of out in the world.

[I SandRock]

I think in BF vehicles ARE way more powerful because they are so rare and yet so strong without many enemy vehicles to counter them..

I think vehicles should remain as powerful as they are currently, but the focus should be put away from these vehicle dominant fights and reach more of a balance of infantry fighting. Currently the only real infantry fighting happens during base fights.

By making the terrain les vehicle accesible you can change this focus. Let vehicles stick to the areas around the main roads. With forests, swams, rocky areas, water, etc. blocking their paths. Make them force back the enemy infantry into these areas with covers and surpress them, not letting them out of the clearings towards the bases. Then it is the task of your air units and infantry to clear them out of their cover completely.

I'd hate to see PS vehicles reduced to an extension of your armor like they are in UT2k4 - UT3. You use vehicles there to do a little more damage and take none, jump out before they explode and continue on foot. PS is not that kinda game, it's not how war should be.

[DviddLeff]

BF's vehicles are an issue because you cant pull your own vehicles to counter others; some smacktard will have taken them already and driven it into the sea, cliff or generally wasted it.

The vehicles verses infantry in BF are pretty balanced; rockets take them down a lot quicker than in PS, and there is little better than sticking C4 all over a tanks rear and running off giggling, primed detonator in hand.

[I SandRock]

Originally Posted by DviddLeff

BF's vehicles are an issue because you cant pull your own vehicles to counter others; some smacktard will have taken them already and driven it into the sea, cliff or generally wasted it.

The vehicles verses infantry in BF are pretty balanced; rockets take them down a lot quicker than in PS, and there is little better than sticking C4 all over a tanks rear and running off giggling, primed detonator in hand.

Yeah but only an idiot uses a BF tank to just drive straight into enemy fire :P If you hang back and nuke from a distance you can reap the kills. Especially if your gunner is an engineer and will jump out to repair. Or you just hide behind a building. All the noobs jump in a tank and drive right in the face of the enemy just to get C4'd or rocketed

[DviddLeff]

True, but the problem is that the maps are too confined in Rush modes; meaning that infantry cant flank the tanks that do that effectively.

[Timantium]

I think most vehicles should be stronger than infantry head to head. Some infantry AV is way too ez mode to be honest. I think the infantry AV could maybe hit a little harder, but be dumb fired like the deci or the lancer.

Squads should have to work together to take out tanks. The mag cannon takes several shots to kill infantry so for all it's strengths I never really felt AI farming was one of them. the Vanny and Prowler have guns that are super powerful against infantry (too powerful), but the tanks are slower, less maneuverable than the Mag, which would be a fair trade if the TR/NC AV weapons weren't so easy to aim...

So the VS get the best tank with the most advanced maneuverability, but it is completely negated against NC/TR infantry because their AV weapons are EZmode and it takes multiple rail gun shots to kill them anyway.

Then the TR/NC tanks, which do get owned by the mag, kill infantry in 1 hit most of the time and the only way VS can counter them is sticking their heads out and shooting a big laser gun at them.

So I would say that, in some cases, the OP's argument is completely unfounded. I have never really felt much of an advantage (against infantry) in the magrider. I definitely could stand to see some reduction in the splash dmg for the big prowler cannon and the vanguard heavy cannon.

[I SandRock]

The thing with the magrider isn't so much that it takes several hits but more that the prowler (not too sure about vanguard) has an arching projectile path which means you can actually shoot over cover and into enemies.
The magrider is very powerful in ranged and when you can see the enemy clearly due to it's accuracy but when there is cover or hills it sucks in that regard

[Bags]

Originally Posted by I SandRock

The thing with the magrider isn't so much that it takes several hits but more that the prowler (not too sure about vanguard) has an arching projectile path which means you can actually shoot over cover and into enemies.
The magrider is very powerful in ranged and when you can see the enemy clearly due to it's accuracy but when there is cover or hills it sucks in that regard

It gives up arching projectile for a straight shooting projectile. While the prowler and vanguard are much harder to use at range, the magrider shines.

Balance my friend.

[I SandRock]

Originally Posted by Bags

It gives up arching projectile for a straight shooting projectile. While the prowler and vanguard are much harder to use at range, the magrider shines.

Balance my friend.

Isn't that exactly what I said?

They are balanced for their AV play, but not for AI due to the situations i described and the fact it can 1 shot AI. And it's definitely not that hard to aim. Not only have I seen medium-long ranged shots hit my first try I've recently had the honor of claiming a hacked vanguard and the projectiles path is pretty predictable. And that's when I had never used one before.

[Bags]

Originally Posted by I SandRock

Isn't that exactly what I said?

Very clever, sandrock.