News: New Planetside 2 Interview on Strategy Informer

[nathanebht]

Originally Posted by EASyEightyEight

I like the idea mentioned earlier, no damage done, but FF still causes grief to accumulate. No one likes getting TKed, especially when they accidentally TK someone from a big outfit and now they're about to find out that guy took it personally and ordered a KoS on them. No one should have to worry about their own team hunting them down over a simple mistake, or even a disagreement in chat. Really, that's just another way to lose a subscription.

But for the most common example, spammers don't stop because they're killing their own guys: they stop because they're quickly approaching weapons lock.

People are selfish.

The only reason I'd want FF turned on is to discourage idiots from stepping and strafing in front of other idiots already firing but that happens SO MUCH in PS1 I'm almost inclined to say that FF isn't working.

Other FPS games train people to strafe and move around a lot. Takes a while to untrain people.

[Tatwi]

Originally Posted by DreaM

Seems like their idea is that they get the game out A.S.A.P to make money and then continually develop the game after. Think of it like the game is constantly being made even post "launch". We're going to see a soft launch of PS2 soon, within the next few months.

If they launch it without friendly fire, they should keep it without adding friendly fire. Adding FF later on would be a change on the level of the infamous "NGE" in SWG, because it would fundamentally change the way people play the game. We all know how well changes of that sort go over for SOE in an already released product.

Friendly Fire: Either have it or don't, I don't personally care, just don't change it after launch.

[EASyEightyEight]

Originally Posted by nathanebht

Other FPS games train people to strafe and move around a lot. Takes a while to untrain people.

I'd believe you... if PS1 wasn't training them to abuse warping as well. And lately, what games allow that play style without punishing you via someone whom can actually land a round or two?

You can untrain strafing by taking a number from the many "lolrealism" shooters out there though: can't hit **** even with a shotgun while moving unless you ADS, which will slow you to a crawl.

Though I don't imagine warping will be nearly as prevalent in PS2 as it was on PS1's crappy code, as it WAS designed to primarily cater to 56k, not broadband. *Shrug* Couple that with lower TTK's, and strafing in the open will probably get you killed more often than not, competent hip-fire accuracy or no.

[FIREk]

i don't recall anyone else posting this, but, other than reducing damage dealt through friendly fire, they could possibly implement a single player-like system for moderating friendly fire.
Basically you can't shoot if you're aiming directly at a friendly and your crosshair turns into an appropriate icon so you know what's wrong. Ideally, the system also drops your weapon a bit, to make it look all tactical, well-drilled and stuff.
Not the ideal system, won't help with grenade spam or more ballistic weapons (cannons etc) but would help with:
a) blatant, direct asshole teamkills,
b) accidentally shoving 5 rounds into the back of a friendly that just ran in front of you,
c) making intentional griefing that much more inconvenient.

And, of course, the grief system will be quite invaluable.

Originally Posted by EASyEightyEight

(...) you can't hit **** even with a shotgun while moving unless you ADS, which will slow you to a crawl.

I agree with what you're getting at, but I must disagree with this particular point. Weapons are surprisingly accurate when fired from the hip in "lolrealism" (not a very fitting name) games, even on the move. I use shotguns in every single game that has them (except for PlanetSide - the only game in which shotguns are no fun at all:P) and I have never aimed down a shotgun's sights out of common sense. I always hit what I want to hit.

[EASyEightyEight]

Shotgun was hyperbole.

Rifle use on the other hand depends on the game I guess. CoD hip fire is only accurate for the first round or two if you're crouched/prone, otherwise running and gunning you don't hit anything unless you get lucky. You don't aim, you just look in their direction and hope for the best. Can't speak for BF. Other games like Brink make nearly no difference between hip fire or ADS. Killzone 2 and 3 just make it a pseudo zoom. Regardless of ADS, your bullets spray everywhere in KZ2, and are laser tight even hip firing in KZ3.

[Aractain]

I don't see the problem with FF being off. FF never stoped anyone from spamming their weapons. People don't care if they kill teammates. It was the greif that stopped people.

As many have said keep the greif and you stop spam near friendlys and you remove TKing which is dumb. Best of both worlds. If you liked being able to TK people... well yeah I don't want you in mah game lol :P

[Graywolves]

Originally Posted by Aractain

I don't see the problem with FF being off. FF never stoped anyone from spamming their weapons. People don't care if they kill teammates. It was the greif that stopped people.

As many have said keep the greif and you stop spam near friendlys and you remove TKing which is dumb. Best of both worlds. If you liked being able to TK people... well yeah I don't want you in mah game lol :P

And then you get people rushing into your line of fire and you're the one being penalised completley for their actions.

[Captain1nsaneo]

Regarding FF: Seeing arguments for, no FF, no FF but with grief, Reduced FF, and Full FF. We shouldn't be asking which is best but which would limit a griefer's actions the most. All following ideas are based on PS as it currently stands.

No FF: I stand in front of a deployed tank/artillery/max he can't do anything. I can stand in a spawn tube and stop people from getting out. I could use friendly vehicles to stop you from leaving the courtyard with a tank. I can stand in front of snipers and constantly shoot them in the face with a weapon with a bright flash or stream (e.g. beamer/dragon). I could stop people from hacking a base or capping an LLU.

No FF w/ Grief: Most of the above but now friendlies will also now get weapons locked when I do it. more pain -> more encouragement to grief

Reduced FF: Throw plaz nades at people and retort when they get mad that it wasn't really doing anything to them. I can run for longer when I annoy people as it takes more effort to kill me. Grief piles up faster because it takes more shots to kill me.

Full FF: Today. Standing on top of flails, bombing funerals, and killing random friendlies who ask for repairs.

Personally I'm in favor of full FF because sometimes you need to kill a friendly. Also because accidentally bombing a friendly AMS is a much worse thing to have done and it just adds to the realism/immersion in general.

[Aractain]

Originally Posted by Graywolves

And then you get people rushing into your line of fire and you're the one being penalised completley for their actions.

That happened to me all the time in PS1, whats the difference? Cloakers running in front of my prowler was a regular occurance. I even felt bad if it was a female character.

[BorisBlade]

Originally Posted by morf

I think grief would have to be revamped to have FF. Also, with increased lethality, I imagine a 4 shot burst from MA to the back of your buddy at point blank would cause a TK. Hopefully once they get live players on the game they can look at all the numbers and figure out how to make it work. But I'm thinking idiots stepping in front of you = dead idiots. I can see how it would suck if 30 percent of deaths in a heavily contested facility were TK's due to the back line firing through the guys up front

Maybe this will keep them from gettin too stupid with reducing TTK's. Honestly we should have the same armor as PS1' agile in teh new rexo equivs of PS2. Adding the ironsights and less bloom on the CoF will greatly increase teh amount of bullets that land and alone will massively shorten TTK's. If they also lower armor alot and add this better accuracy, its gonna get stupid. And TTK's that are too low cause this FF issue. Better to just increase TTK via the accuracy of the ironsights rather than makin everyone wear paper armor.

Sorry but if your game causes lots of friendly death because you have TTK's too low, then you prob need to increase the TTK a bit. No quick firing weapon's 4 round burst should be killin anyone from full health to zero anyway. And DO NOT do any cheap fix like making FF do lower damage. It must be FULL DAMAGE in order for teh gameplay to work right. If its causin too much to friendlies, adjust the TTK or functionality, do not cheat it like was done with teh lasher's lash. It ultimately ended up being 95% removed because its function was bad, if you cheat it you just put more bad functionality into the game. Do it right from the start and you dont have to deal with the issues of a bad system.

[basti]

Originally Posted by Captain1nsaneo

Regarding FF: Seeing arguments for, no FF, no FF but with grief, Reduced FF, and Full FF. We shouldn't be asking which is best but which would limit a griefer's actions the most. All following ideas are based on PS as it currently stands.

No FF: I stand in front of a deployed tank/artillery/max he can't do anything. I can stand in a spawn tube and stop people from getting out. I could use friendly vehicles to stop you from leaving the courtyard with a tank. I can stand in front of snipers and constantly shoot them in the face with a weapon with a bright flash or stream (e.g. beamer/dragon). I could stop people from hacking a base or capping an LLU.

No FF w/ Grief: Most of the above but now friendlies will also now get weapons locked when I do it. more pain -> more encouragement to grief

Reduced FF: Throw plaz nades at people and retort when they get mad that it wasn't really doing anything to them. I can run for longer when I annoy people as it takes more effort to kill me. Grief piles up faster because it takes more shots to kill me.

Full FF: Today. Standing on top of flails, bombing funerals, and killing random friendlies who ask for repairs.

Personally I'm in favor of full FF because sometimes you need to kill a friendly. Also because accidentally bombing a friendly AMS is a much worse thing to have done and it just adds to the realism/immersion in general.

Aye, that pretty much hits it.

Lets face it: There arent much guys out there that would just nuke the crap out of friendly. The few who ever tried that got grief locked quite quickly.

Besides that, those new players who may have problems with friend/foe stuff learn it quite quickly. And even if you get Grief issues at the beginning, once you learned a bit, you are fine.

And, besides all that: Everyone who ever bombed in a lib to drop a full load of Bombs on a friendly ams by accident, just to notice his mistake before the bombs hit know how goddamn crazy that feeling is. You know you screwed up, you know theres no damage done yet, but it will be done, and theres nothing you can do now, and you just pray to a god of your choosing that you dont kill 2 many of you guys.

Leave Friendly Fire the way it is. Its great.

[Bags]

Originally Posted by IDukeNukeml

I agree with this 120%. Friendly fire should be reflected upon the person dealing it.

That's easily exploitable.

[Tapman]

Originally Posted by IDukeNukeml

I agree with this 120%. Friendly fire should be reflected upon the person dealing it.

The problem still exists where you will have to try to differentiate between trolls dancing in front of FF and noobs/idiots trying to run through Rambo/Matrix style.

Keep friendly fire the way it is, add a grief forgiveness option. Edit: Make it easier to identify friendly units for people driving/gunning vehicles, that should help cut back on the accidental FF. (No more running over a friendly cloaker because their name didn't show up!)

[Graywolves]

Originally Posted by Aractain

That happened to me all the time in PS1, whats the difference? Cloakers running in front of my prowler was a regular occurance. I even felt bad if it was a female character.

But in PS1 they take damage so they're going to either die or move out of the way. If they don't take damage in PS2 they will just stay there and you will either get weapons locked or have to move or just wait.

And don't worry, they're really men.

[Minigun]

why not make FF do full damage to the person your attacking, you accumulate grief, and ALSO you take the same ammount of damage you just delt. or perhaps a little less just for those little accidents. that discourages everyone from doing it.

edit: full friendly fire with grief with no reflection penalty until 100grief.
at 100 grief still 100% FF but you gain 50% reflected back at you
at 200 grief still 100% FF you gain 100% reflected back at you
at XXX grief weapons lock, log off and think about who is who before you pull the trigger