[MasterChief096]

Honestly, three continents simply isn't going to be big enough for this game I think, unless there are going to be tons and tons of servers, way more than the five in the original PlanetSide. More continents are going to be a must.

I also think that sanctuary continents can satisfy the needs of both the nostalgic vets, those who think they are a good idea, and those who are advocating footholds over sanctuaries

I think all footholds should be converted to universal broadcast warpgates, and that each continent should have at least five warpgates. Each empire should have a sanctuary. The sanctuary should abide by a population lock, 1000 empire-specific players per sanctuary, and then a new instance can bud off to accommodate other players if needed, or there can be a minimum of three sanctuary instances (maybe just three separate sanctuary continents in general) that can be used. Think HART A, B, and C as being their own continents, except exactly identical.

The design of the sanctuary would have be entirely revamped to ensure ease of access to contestable continents.

The center of the sanctuary would have a huge HART building that could shuttle troops, has terminals, and just has cool rooms like the current HART buildings do. Immediately outside of that, and I mean like five feet outside of that building, is a circular arrangement of alternating vehicle pads. Every other one would be a huge air vehicle pad, the in-between ones would be ground vehicle pads. There would be 20 pads around the central HART structure. Each pad would have a set of two respawn tubes, to allow troops to spawn from any continent in the game or anywhere in sanctuary directly onto a vehicle pad. This removes the 5-15 second long run in PlanetSide to get to a vehicle pad of your choosing.

With the central HART structure and the vehicle pads packed as densely as possible, the perimeter around the pads itself is rather large and spacious to allow for the coordination of raids and outfits. Three to four warpgates encircle the wide "field".

This design would not be a nuisance in terms of pacing whatsoever. If I died on Indar, depending on my rig, I could respawn at sanctuary directly at a vehicle pad, pull the vehicle, and drive/fly into a warpgate within 30 seconds, depending on vehicle timers. I could lounge around sanctuary if I want by going to the VR or exploring the HART building also.

Pros of this set-up

- Nostalgic players are kept happy
- It still doesn't take a very long time at all to get into combat. Hell, it would take less time than it takes for BF3 to load and start a new map, especially with the 30 seconds or whatever it is that everyone has to wait anyways.
- There are more warpgates on each continent than just three, and all are universal, this spices up the diversity of battles that can happen, and adds to the depth of potential tactics and strategy that can occur.
- Empire's still have privacy when amassing formations to hit a continent, and the location of that raid is kept in utmost secrecy until the raid actually hits.
- There is an empire-specific "lounging and AFKing" center for everyone to enjoy.
- Domination of a continent can still happen in the traditional sense in the same way, simply kicking the other empires off the continent and forcing them back to their sanctuaries.
- People who advocate the current foothold system still have the ability to be on any continent at any time. If you feel like four-five warpgates is too much variety, then simply restrict each empire to only being able to go through three, with a little bit of overlap between empire's and which warpgates they share. Put this on a rotation and bam! you get more variety. This works a lot better for battle diversity than each empire only having ONE place to attack from on each continent, as the other two empires will ALWAYS know where to go to prevent an attack from that empire.
- Consider an empire getting sanctuary locked. In PlanetSide, that empire has two choices, each a single ES warpgate on two separate continents. Easy to predict and manage. If an empire gets sanctuary locked in this setup, they can regroup and make some serious tactical decisions as to where they want to go, and how they want to go in based on the five different warpgates.

Cons

- There is still a loading screen involved, but like I said, it would still probably take less time to pull a new vehicle at sanctuary and get it back to the continent than it would take for a new BF3 match to start if timing from the end of a match itself.

If the only real gripe with this setup is a loading screen and possible queues, I fail to see how this would be different from footholds. If your empire has population-locked a continent, then you will still have to wait in a queue before going there, its just how you wait in that queue. Get all set up at sanctuary and then fly into a warpgate for the queue, or be in a queue right from the launch screen. Also, the total number of loading screens this puts into the game is - you guessed it - one. ONE loading screen. Ok two - starting the game up into sanctuary, and then one to get onto a continent. Once you are on a continent, you are on that continent, and the only loading screens you will see will be the ones you choose to see, such as flying through a broadcast into another broadcast.

Now, with beta in mind, I think that the current system works for quickly testing the mechanics of the game, but ultimately I think the proposed system would work better for launch and for the implementation of new continents in the future.