Motivate us, this game is BORING.

[MrVicchio]

Author Topic: Motivation
SmarmyBastich
Station Member
Registered: Apr 2003 posted 04-14-2003 02:34 PM user search report post
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I would really like to say that this is a great game but I really can't. The concept is spectacular as is the story and the options available for character development. Unfortunately there are some really huge problems.
The focus of the game play is to kill members of the opposing army. That�s great except for the fact that it doesn't matter. When you kill some one they come right back at a spawn point and the opposing army never feels the loss. Since killing the enemy really doesn't make a difference then one should be taking bases and towers for tactical advantage. This, however, is not the case. The incentives for taking and keeping bases and towers are next to non-existent. Add on the fact that many of the bases and towers change hands every ten or fifteen minutes the motivation for taking and guarding the bases lessens even more.

The armies them selves are very lacking. There are no command structures to help provide direction toward victory. There is not even an overall idea of strategic goals that say, "Here is what we need to do to win this war."

Now before you get started on it. I understand that this is supposed to be a "un-ending war" but even so there has to be some sort of reason give to keep fighting aside from "killing a bunch of enemies who are going to come back anyways" Players really need some better goals than that to keep them coming back and paying the $10+ dollars a month. They need to be able to make accomplishments and headway against the enemy. I understand that you can get together with a squad of ten or so people and work together to capture a few bases but what does that matter when you move onto the next base and a lone hacker stops by and re-captures the base you just worked so hard for.

The way the game is set up has made almost everything the players do pointless. You kill someone, they respawn in a minute. You take a base, it gets recaptured in 10 minutes and didn't provide you or your team with anything really valuable while you had it anyways. Anything this futile just can't last very long. Players really need more benefits for taking/keeping bases and towers and some sort of chain of command that could provide strategies on a �Whole Army� type scale could really help.


Number of posts comming, read the full thread for more insight.

SmokeJumperPS
Station Admin
Registered: Sep 2001 posted 04-14-2003 02:43 PM user search report post
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I'll answer this because it's a common sort of post. I'm not going to try to answer everything because I'd like it to be a discussion, if possible. If I don't provide an answer, I'll counter with a question so I can get more info before answering.
>> "Killing folks doesn't matter." Question: Does it matter in other games? If so...then how?

Now...before you answer, trust me when I say that we ARE adding incentives to the game. This is beta and there's still stuff rolling in, but I'm curious what sorts of things you're looking for in this regard.

>> "No command structure." The actual truth is that folks haven't gained enough command rank to get to the abilities that allow command structure to appear. There are a large number of command abilities up the CEP ladder...and we'll be making it a bit easier to get to a lot of them soon. (Currently, CEP accrual seems to be slower than we expected and we'll most likely be changing that soon.)

>> "Everything we do is pointless". Again, the same sort of question. When you play CS, or T2, or UT...what sorts of victory conditions do you find NOT pointless?

Thanks in advance. Let's discuss.

SmokeJumperPS
Station Admin
Registered: Sep 2001 posted 04-14-2003 03:28 PM user search report post
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Thanks for the quality discussion so far. A few thoughts in response to some of your points:
a) We agree there needs to be more incentive to defending (and keeping) bases. Your comment about "letting it fall so you can get more xp by retaking it" is a pointed one. We're working on fixing this issue.

b) As for keeping folks coming back...I've had a lot of comments come my way like "I played PS for a few days, then went back to UT and didn't like it at all because it felt like nothing was going on and there were no tactical choices." (Not saying that's correct...don't flame me on it...just repeating a quote.)

On the other hand, I agree we need to keep doing things in the game to keep the appetites of FPSers sharp and hungry. We absolutely plan to do this and we're getting some announcements ready now to let you know what's coming in the first three months after release. We can keep you entertained longer and with more variety than any game existing or planned. You'll see.

c) There's lots of things coming, like the 24-hour "victory boards" that show how Empires do on a continent-by-continent and worldwide basis. Also stat boards for highest ranked players and Outfits. All that will be in before Release.

d) I sincerely believe that we offer more in the way of game variety and goals than any other game out there. You're correct that there's no 20-minute timer with a clear victory condition afterward, but the "phantom hacker" issue currently on the Beta servers is known and will be eradicated soon. Once that occurs, I think you'll see gameflow going the direction you all are indicating in these posts.

SmokeJumperPS
Station Admin
Registered: Sep 2001 posted 04-14-2003 04:03 PM user search report post
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BobO...that will be done. We're revamping the main website now to include a lot of "at-a-glance" world conditions to make it easier to check world status when out-of-game.
Perhaps the victory condition you're looking for is the 24-hour winner list we're going to show off soon. That list essentially counts up the number of minutes that each Empire owned each base on each continent. We then tally it all up and declare a "winner" on each continent each day (status is shown along the way so you can check at any time to see how you're doing). Additionally, we do a straight tally of the 10 continent winners and compute who "won" the world for that day. We'll show tracking on that info so you can graph the ups and downs of your Empire on your server. That will help. Yes?

Additionally, I think much of the perception that "it all goes for naught" is the problem with the solo hacker or "phantom hacker (as we refer to it) issue. Once that is resolved I think you'll see significant gameflow change and we may want to revisit this discussion.

Don't forget the other non-obvious MMOFPS advantages:

a) Server stability and reliablity.

b) Security. We do a LOT to prevent cheating, griefing, and we never sneak in rules changes without telling you (unlike privately hosted servers).

c) Permanence. You can find the same players quite often on your world server. This allows much more permanence in association and makes it much easier to find like-minded folks to game with. Play for a while, and you're almost literally going to fall into associations that will enhance your gaming.

d) Gigantic worlds and scale. This is self-obvious, but the gaming experience just can't be matched in other games.

e) Continuous upgrade of content over time after release.

f) A monthly fee is cheap. $10-15 a month is just not much...*IF* this is a game you find worthy of that amount of cash. But to find it worthy, do some fair comparisons. How many games do you buy that aren't worth a dang? I buy 2-3 of those every month. They sound great, but they actually stink up the place. At $30 a crack, that's pretty expensive. However, if I *like* the game (and you won't be paying subscription fees if you *don't* like the game) then $12 a month to continuously see more variety and improved gameplay each month seems pretty cheap to me. Of course, my viewpoint is biased. So what are your thoughts?

SmokeJumperPS
Station Admin
Registered: Sep 2001 posted 04-14-2003 07:44 PM user search report post
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Items to note from your conversations (good things):
a) You'll like the extent of the statistics we're keeping.

b) The state of the world will be available on the front page of www.planetside.com soon.

c) Your favorite stats will be available there also.

d) We're adding incentives for almost everything you mentioned (predominant suggestions are defense incentives and reasons for continent locks).

e) Lots of the other ideas you guys mention here are good ones and I'm scribbling them down for later. Remember...this isn't just a "release and forget it" game. We will be supporting this game with hosts of improvements, additions, and radical expansions later on. We'll never change the core gameplay in areas you've already explored (besides minor additions like extra vehicles and such), but the sky's the limit when we introduce completely new arenas later on. There's a lot of stuff coming down the pike over the coming year. Lots.

http://boards.station.sony.com/ubb/p...ML/005855.html

[Metalloid]

Hmm. I can think back to a really crappy game called WW2OL that had balance issues and a seeming lack of motivation. The game has NPC guards now and a great community that has rivalry between players as well as the the armies.

I think Planetside has a potential to be great. As long as the dev's have their heads on their shoulders I think they will be trying to make the game the best it can be.
(not to mention, their success puts food on the table)

[Hamma]

Some nice comments in this thread

[FireFrenzy]

We can keep you entertained longer and with more variety than any game existing or planned. You'll see.

Very bold statement, intriguing to say the least, and I can't wait to see

[BigDickMccoy]

I had an Idea for a incentive system and i wanted to run it by some people. A monitary system were you get paid for the number of bases you control. Then Use these funds to buy war equipment. Just a quick thought, cause even comparing stats can get boring after a while

[NapalmEnima]

The dev's pulled the economy system out many moons ago... no money.

[Havs]

I had always thought the number of bases per continent is currently way too many. If you were to reduce the number of bases from up to 15 on some continents down to around 5-8 you'll see alot more action. With fewer bases around, there'll be alot more contention for them, since they'll hold alot more meaning. You wont see nearly as many empty bases, and you'll increase the potential of some truly epic battles (they might want to prevent this as much as possible due to lag issues).

If there were only 5-8 bases per continent you'd see almost every base under constant contest. Taking a base would actually mean alot, because it gives you a major foothold on that continent. Currently, even if a continent is locked, its not very hard for another empire to come in and find a lightly or completely undefended base to unlock the continent. With fewer bases, you'd be assured that a continental lock would be extremely hard to break because each base would have a sizable force guarding it.

They definately need inscentives for defending a base though. Currently its much more advantageous to be on offense, from both an enjoyment, and experience point of view. People just dont see a reason to defend.

[Metroid]

I agree, I've yet to lead a squad that said, "Let's go defend the bases in esamir!". Everytime I say, "Forming squad to hit Cyssor", I get flooded with vanu tells wanting to go.. just because it's more fun to be in a real battle.

[Hellsfire123]

I cant tell, was the starter of the thread in beta at all? Im in beta obviously, and ive never had a problem with any of these things.

[gonnagetyou]

When it comes to gaining control of and loosing control of bases, what if there was a positive and negative bonus applied to every controlling faction member on the continent?

I'm new to the forums and the game so correct me if I'm wrong.

Currently players gain experience for taking over a base.

What if you added a small experience bonus to every person in the same faction who is currently on the continent that the base is located on?

In return, if your faction looses the base then everyone on the continent in that faction recieves a small negative modifier to their experience.

This would give people some incenetive to patrol or post guards at key facilities.

Is this a feasible addition to the scoring system?

Maybe even add a small faction bonus to everyone for each consecutive hour you control that facility.

[Viva]

Currently I see only about 1k peeps logging on in the evenings and 2k on the weekends. Wait till we have about 20k then the maps shouldn't feel so large. It has been easy pickens for me to hack bases but I'm sure those days are numbered.

[Masurao]

Im my opinion the NPC guards would be such a bad idea....This way you wouldn't need to have people always posted at a base to try and defend it. Now Defending is well and good, and it can be fun when its an all out battle. But in the time it takes to get into the HEART and get to the base the base has been over run.

Now the Insentive, where you you lose some points and gain some points when ur fraction gets a base, would def. incurrage people to defend. But people will get mad when they land on a continent and lose 1000 points b4 they even start walikng.

Anyways, the NPC defenders can act as garrison and NOT respawn, making taking bases form people a little less frustraiting. And to stop, or slow down, people from attacking bases at 4 AM and taking it.(Yes I know there are auto-turrets after you cap that one basee...but like those really do anything)

Well if ya make any sence out of this I say NPC defeneders

[Sata]

i havent acctualy played PlanetSide yet, i am looking forward to its release. the only thing im am worried about is that the game will turn out to have the same team effort as T2 did. that is to say, the game was designed in a very team oriented way, but it never really came to happen.
i have seen a lot about precautions to prevent this, but i still dont know...

[mistled]

From my experience in game, not having a squad around you sucks. Yeah, you can do the lone stealth hacker thing, but once you hit a base where a couple of guys have darklight (which is about every base it seems), you're screwed. Especially in the early stages of when you are playing and don't have many cert points, it is crucial to have people around you who can do other things (defend you if you are the hacker, repair you if you are a max, fly you somewhere if you are anyone , hack the cc with some decent speed if you are a base stormer, etc).
You don't have to be in a squad for those things, but you do need people around you. I was very skeptical of their being able to make PS a team game, but I think they have done it well. The problem with teams in tribes was that you didn't actually need the other player types, they were just options for you. In PS, you actually need various player types to be successful.

[Happy lil Elf]

If you want a lonewolf game I'll tell you what the devs will not: This game is not for you. If you want to be able to run into an enemy base by youself, kill everyone and capture it, this game is not for you. Everything about this game screams teamwork. They won't come right out and say that though because, obviously, they want you to buy it.

This isn't to say you can do things without a sqaud, but rather that if you think running at a base that has defenses with your guns blazing by yourself will get you somewhere, it won't. Teamwork and organization are the keys to this game more so that any |337ness on any one single players part.

In short, find an outfit you like. It'll probably be much more fun in the long run.

Oh and yeah as for the bases all being empty I have a feeling that may change once the open beta starts.