Cont Lock finally?

**Muldoon** · 2014-06-02, 12:14 AM

Originally Posted by Mordelicius

I don't recall using the term holding hands, nor it's in that spirit lol.

Think of another game, say, basketball. A referee would draw random circles on the ground where offense can't step on. After watching the offense dance around like clown just to get off a shot, the ball changes hands and now it's the other team to do it on the other side.

Hockey for the longest time had something like this. It was called the goalie's crease. An opposing player wasn't allowed to score while in the crease. It made it so the goalie had a buffer zone of not being interfered with. The No Deploy Zone is also similar to a modern offsides. It prevents you from goal hanging, which is similar to placing a sunderer directly on the capture point.

Originally Posted by Mordelicius

I think it is exaggerated how these mines affect newbie experience. Most of the vehicle pads are located about 5 feet from the console. I assume most players have use of at least one eye. And it's no different that laying AI mines on stairs or doorways.

Instead newbies are leaving because of gameplay imbalances:

Exaggerated or not, it adds very little to the game vs the amount of cheap and cheese for players who like to mine the pads. A variety of cheese is still cheese.

The reason most noobs left was because of performance until OMFG. After that, it's usually one of these: not being able to find a fight, or dying a lot. Some players have no idea how they're dying and the feedback the game gave was very sparse and difficult to understand. That's one of the reasons we added the killcam. Personally, I wanted to go further with the killcam, but what we have is still pretty good.

Originally Posted by Mordelicius

Finally, I reiterate that this is a philosophic battle whether the Devs should jump in or keep their hands off gameplay and leave player interactions to just the players.

There's no "we keep hands off gameplay." Everything we do has some hands on or design direction. For the best games out there, it's really hard to notice the designer's hand in the game, because it all flows so smoothly. There are some rough edges where you can see the designer's hand, but I don't agree with your solutions to fix that roughness.

Azzzz · 2014-06-02, 03:08 AM

Well least they're talking to each other. Good to see a PSU poster interact with a Dev and vice versa.

Whether they agree or not is up in the air.

Illtempered · 2014-06-02, 02:32 PM

Originally Posted by Muldoon

Hockey for the longest time had something like this. It was called the goalie's crease. An opposing player wasn't allowed to score while in the crease. It made it so the goalie had a buffer zone of not being interfered with. The No Deploy Zone is also similar to a modern offsides. It prevents you from goal hanging, which is similar to placing a sunderer directly on the capture point.

Exaggerated or not, it adds very little to the game vs the amount of cheap and cheese for players who like to mine the pads. A variety of cheese is still cheese.

The reason most noobs left was because of performance until OMFG. After that, it's usually one of these: not being able to find a fight, or dying a lot. Some players have no idea how they're dying and the feedback the game gave was very sparse and difficult to understand. That's one of the reasons we added the killcam. Personally, I wanted to go further with the killcam, but what we have is still pretty good.

There's no "we keep hands off gameplay." Everything we do has some hands on or design direction. For the best games out there, it's really hard to notice the designer's hand in the game, because it all flows so smoothly. There are some rough edges where you can see the designer's hand, but I don't agree with your solutions to fix that roughness.

My apologies if I offend, but I think this is exactly the kind of development mind-set that is ruining this game. I completely disagree with you and don't think you understand the very core-mechanics of what makes Planetside tick.

It's about giving us a big free and open world, a bunch of cool weapons to blow shit up with, and letting us go. You want to hold our hand. No thanks. I understand this is not always a nub-friendly environment, and may not live up to your profit-making expectations. Continue to sell-out as much as you need to. In the mean-time real gamers will go find the games on the cutting-edge, just like we did with Planetside 1.

KesTro · 2014-06-02, 04:07 PM

Originally Posted by Illtempered

My apologies if I offend, but I think this is exactly the kind of development mind-set that is ruining this game. I completely disagree with you and don't think you understand the very core-mechanics of what makes Planetside tick.

It's about giving us a big free and open world, a bunch of cool weapons to blow shit up with, and letting us go. You want to hold our hand. No thanks. I understand this is not always a nub-friendly environment, and may not live up to your profit-making expectations. Continue to sell-out as much as you need to. In the mean-time real gamers will go find the games on the cutting-edge, just like we did with Planetside 1.

And I have to disagree with you. I think the mindset of keeping newbies interested in the game is more important than anything else. Players are the content of this game. You can all add all the cool weapons to blow shit up, all the freedom in the world to do whatever you want and none of it will matter if the game doesn't have the player base to support it. I don't know about you but this 'real-gamer' is staying right here with a game he loves. You're welcome to go play call of battlefield if that's your idea of a real game.

Offensive quips aside they have said from the beginning that this game would be like a bad battlefield clone and slowly get more and more planetside elements over the year. It's nice to get some features in the game that can keep everyone happy but imo I think more so than the newbies who the devs like to hold hands its the 'vets' who are influencing the game in a bad way. They're so set on 'This is how it was in PS1 and it worked. So surely it needs to be in PS2.' This has been hashed out countless times and theres a bunch of good arguments for and against that idea but at the end of the day Planetside 1 and Planetside 2 are 'not' the same game, quit trying to make them the same.

Figment · 2014-06-03, 06:28 AM

Originally Posted by Illtempered

My apologies if I offend, but I think this is exactly the kind of development mind-set that is ruining this game. I completely disagree with you and don't think you understand the very core-mechanics of what makes Planetside tick.

It's about giving us a big free and open world, a bunch of cool weapons to blow shit up with, and letting us go. You want to hold our hand. No thanks. I understand this is not always a nub-friendly environment, and may not live up to your profit-making expectations. Continue to sell-out as much as you need to. In the mean-time real gamers will go find the games on the cutting-edge, just like we did with Planetside 1.

Being able to get new players into the game (even the fodder types) and retaining them is extremely important to players.

What we lacked in PS1 for a long time (till the "tutorial missions") was a proper introduction design. I feel PS2 shouldn't have launched life without one.

In part, I agree with you that DURING THE GAME, the player doesn't need to be held hands. Think like mines on vehicle pads... Eh. They're the most logical spot to place them, are they not? So just make sure that when a player pulls a vehicle, he has a good oversight from the console on the vehicle pad: any blowing up is then your own fault. Of course, in PS2, the consoles are sometimes inside a room, or way above with the vehicle pads 50+m away. In some cases, we even had vehicle pads you could use as an enemy, with an enemy SHIELD in front of it (!). You know, at that base people refered to as the Star Ship Troopers fort.

But the problem is that players should be taught valuable skills before entering the game. They should understand the map, but not just the icons, what it means, strategically. I really liked that PS1 eventually had all these pop ups and exclamation marks for new characters, to make it easy to draw attention to things and explain it.

But even knowing the equipment or consoles is not enough - even if a must - doesn't suffice. The VR-Room is important (and IMO, players should probably start here, so they know of its existance and also, since it's an environment where people can ask questions and get an answer).

Currently I think the new player is not taught some of the more important stuff. One of the most important things is teaching the player to communicate with others. And be very clear and predictable in how and when these chat commands work (influence of zones, etc.)

The most important thing however, is teaching a player about situational awareness. Now, what this dev is on about, is teaching them while playing, after they got killed. Possibly, it might be more interesting to teach them off-line on where you could expect what kind of danger from. To teach them just how much danger there is. And that you should always be aware that any form of tunnelvision leads to being killed by something else from the side, above or behind.

I think it's more important to teach them how to move through terrain infested by hundreds of people (and how to observe the fight before making a move), than teach them to burst fire. Teaching them what information they need, where they can find it or how they can obtain it. Or at least, how they can reocgnise it and then how to use that information.

For instance, how to deal with camped and defending situations (where to check for enemies, what units to prioritise (those camping close, medics, spawn vehicles, etc), last resort: respawn elsewhere). Also teaching them that the most straightforward route may not be the most succesful route. Teach them to flank. Teach them to think about what their opponents will be trying to do and how.

This can be done with simulaitons, or even a paused scene from an actual player assault on a base, where in different moments different situations are recorded and frozen for the new player to learn from (both good things and mistakes, like running into a firing squad time and again instead of coming up with a different approach).

Teach them to be creative with the tools they have. Teach them to prepare for the next fight by reading the map and noticing what is going on, so they learn how to make a choice on where to go, why and what they can expect in terms of enemies and friendlies turning up. If you want to take a base three lattice points down the road, what counter-actions can you expect from enemies? What equipment will they be able to bring and what kind of preventive measures could you take? Should you consider changing vehicle?

But above all... Teach them that most of this knowledge will come over the months you play. Teach them that getting better and mastering this is the ultimate challenge. Don't teach them that short term gain (kills, exp) is relevant. Teach them the long term objectives.

A lot of those things people learn from experience. And it is exactly that gap of experience that a lot of people have with those who already play (or are simply smarter and adapt quick) that prevents them from getting into a demanding PvP MMO like this game.

This could partially be done with a simulator against AI, it could be done with "(De)Briefing Tutorials" (tactical analysis of a player battle as described before).

But the problem with that all, is that it's an awful lot of work. Plus... I'm not impressed with the tactical analysis prowess I've seen that lead to the various base designs and camping in the first place, so I'm not sure I'd trust the dev team to provide this properly.

It would be good if tutorial videos could be submitted by players though and accessed from in game, sorted by category of gameplay and situations.

Mordelicius · 2014-06-04, 04:20 AM

Originally Posted by Muldoon

Hockey for the longest time had something like this. It was called the goalie's crease. An opposing player wasn't allowed to score while in the crease. It made it so the goalie had a buffer zone of not being interfered with. The No Deploy Zone is also similar to a modern offsides. It prevents you from goal hanging, which is similar to placing a sunderer directly on the capture point.

No clue how hockey is played but again, it's a simple rule of reciprocity. Defense is allowed to put a Sunderer next to a capture point, yes? But as I've said before, the official reason is equidistant spawn for both defense and offense. A more reasonable NDZ would be 10-20 feet at most. The current NDZ is HUGE to afford that distance parity.

As for the hockey thing. I've seen this hockey video before. What if I implement a PS2-style no-sneaking-behind-the-goal-post-like-a-ninja-zone. That wild move would not ever happen ever. I read the Youtube comments and they are going crazy about this move.

Dropping a huge offensive no-skating zone circle around that goalpost would severely reduce alot of gameplay as well, I'd say.

Exaggerated or not, it adds very little to the game vs the amount of cheap and cheese for players who like to mine the pads. A variety of cheese is still cheese.

I'm confused by this statement. It's just normal pvp gameplay, which is player to player interaction, which has risk and reward. If a player sees it, they shoot it (and the resource is wasted). If they don't, they blow up if they don't have mineguard.

Most pads are 5 feet away from the console. In a middle of a raging fight. you mean to tell me, 5-20 guys with line-of-sight won't spot it? Because that's the crux of it. I'm talking about mining it in a middle of a fight, especially at the crucial vehicle pad next to the Tech Plant SCU. I really doubt there's someone going around, randomly mining empty bases just to make alot of newbies quit.

Also, how is dropping an AV mine on a vehicle pad different from dropping AI mine on a stair or a doorway? The way you characterize newbies, means they will just die off these mines and they will quit as well.

And I sincerely doubt you would call dropping AI mine on a stair, door or an elevator pad cheesy too. Because if it is, then as all slippery slopes go, the AI mines will be next to drop off the precipice.

The reason most noobs left was because of performance until OMFG. After that, it's usually one of these: not being able to find a fight, or dying a lot. Some players have no idea how they're dying and the feedback the game gave was very sparse and difficult to understand. That's one of the reasons we added the killcam. Personally, I wanted to go further with the killcam, but what we have is still pretty good.

What about now? What's the biggest reason why newbies are leaving after OMFG?

I'm pretty sure Higby said kill-cam was added to stop newbs from being farmed or something to that effect, especially by Snipers. That's why imo, it's better off to just remove their stealth ability. Stealths are for infiltrators. Having triple advantage of ranged, stealth and 1-shot kill is broken.

There's no "we keep hands off gameplay." Everything we do has some hands on or design direction. For the best games out there, it's really hard to notice the designer's hand in the game, because it all flows so smoothly. There are some rough edges where you can see the designer's hand, but I don't agree with your solutions to fix that roughness.

Let me explain what I meant by the phrase "hands off". It simply meant let players interact with players, and let that interaction be the pvp gameplay. NDZ is not Player vs. Player interaction. It's Player vs. Dev interaction.

If I try to park on the NDZ:
- Am I interacting with other players? No
- Am I fighting other players? No
- What gameplay is created? None
- Who is preventing me from parking? The Devs
- Then who am I fighting? The Devs
- Who is winning? The Devs
- Are the Devs a faction? No
- Is there a gameplay born out of this Player-Dev NDZ interaction? None

I could do the same comparison with the Vehicle pads, Jumppads and Death Cam. We're not talking about safezone areas like the Warpgate or Spawn rooms. It's in the middle of the battlefield.

Who determines what Continent will be locked? Player vs Player interactions. Who determines who parks in the NDZ? Developers, not Player vs. Player interation. Do players have any input to at least turn it off via generator? None. There is literally no player input, interaction or gameplay with this system. It's not like a Generator mechanic, which has pvp and gameplay implications.

Give us tools instead that effect the same NDZ using Player vs. Player interaction (which is gameplay).

Example: I suggested the Sunderer Jammer as alternative even before NDZ was released.

- Offense deploys AMS Sunderer.
- Defense deploys Sunderer Jammer and prevents AMS Sundy from spawning player.
- That interaction has the same effect but is a Player vs. Player interaction (which is pvp is called Gameplay).
- Offense can move the AMS Sundy from the Sundy Jammer's AOE or just blow it up.
- Defense can defend the Sundy jammer or attack the AMS Sundy or both.
- All of these Player vs. Player gameplay interaction. The Devs ideally would have just given us tool fight each other, while removing their "hands on" fingerprint in-game, hence "hands off".

**Muldoon** · 2014-06-04, 01:44 PM

Originally Posted by Mordelicius

No clue how hockey is played but again, it's a simple rule of reciprocity. Defense is allowed to put a Sunderer next to a capture point, yes? But as I've said before, the official reason is equidistant spawn for both defense and offense. A more reasonable NDZ would be 10-20 feet at most. The current NDZ is HUGE to afford that distance parity.

As for the hockey thing. I've seen this hockey video before. What if I implement a PS2-style no-sneaking-behind-the-goal-post-like-a-ninja-zone. That wild move would not ever happen ever. I read the Youtube comments and they are going crazy about this move.

Dropping a huge offensive no-skating zone circle around that goalpost would severely reduce alot of gameplay as well, I'd say.

I'm confused by this statement. It's just normal pvp gameplay, which is player to player interaction, which has risk and reward. If a player sees it, they shoot it (and the resource is wasted). If they don't, they blow up if they don't have mineguard.

Most pads are 5 feet away from the console. In a middle of a raging fight. you mean to tell me, 5-20 guys with line-of-sight won't spot it? Because that's the crux of it. I'm talking about mining it in a middle of a fight, especially at the crucial vehicle pad next to the Tech Plant SCU. I really doubt there's someone going around, randomly mining empty bases just to make alot of newbies quit.

Also, how is dropping an AV mine on a vehicle pad different from dropping AI mine on a stair or a doorway? The way you characterize newbies, means they will just die off these mines and they will quit as well.

And I sincerely doubt you would call dropping AI mine on a stair, door or an elevator pad cheesy too. Because if it is, then as all slippery slopes go, the AI mines will be next to drop off the precipice.

What about now? What's the biggest reason why newbies are leaving after OMFG?

I'm pretty sure Higby said kill-cam was added to stop newbs from being farmed or something to that effect, especially by Snipers. That's why imo, it's better off to just remove their stealth ability. Stealths are for infiltrators. Having triple advantage of ranged, stealth and 1-shot kill is broken.

Let me explain what I meant by the phrase "hands off". It simply meant let players interact with players, and let that interaction be the pvp gameplay. NDZ is not Player vs. Player interaction. It's Player vs. Dev interaction.

If I try to park on the NDZ:
- Am I interacting with other players? No
- Am I fighting other players? No
- What gameplay is created? None
- Who is preventing me from parking? The Devs
- Then who am I fighting? The Devs
- Who is winning? The Devs
- Are the Devs a faction? No
- Is there a gameplay born out of this Player-Dev NDZ interaction? None

I could do the same comparison with the Vehicle pads, Jumppads and Death Cam. We're not talking about safezone areas like the Warpgate or Spawn rooms. It's in the middle of the battlefield.

Who determines what Continent will be locked? Player vs Player interactions. Who determines who parks in the NDZ? Developers, not Player vs. Player interation. Do players have any input to at least turn it off via generator? None. There is literally no player input, interaction or gameplay with this system. It's not like a Generator mechanic, which has pvp and gameplay implications.

Give us tools instead that effect the same NDZ using Player vs. Player interaction (which is gameplay).

Example: I suggested the Sunderer Jammer as alternative even before NDZ was released.

- Offense deploys AMS Sunderer.
- Defense deploys Sunderer Jammer and prevents AMS Sundy from spawning player.
- That interaction has the same effect but is a Player vs. Player interaction (which is pvp is called Gameplay).
- Offense can move the AMS Sundy from the Sundy Jammer's AOE or just blow it up.
- Defense can defend the Sundy jammer or attack the AMS Sundy or both.
- All of these Player vs. Player gameplay interaction. The Devs ideally would have just given us tool fight each other, while removing their "hands on" fingerprint in-game, hence "hands off".

You put a lot of content in your posts, and again, I disagree with a lot of it from a game design point of view.

You say No deploy zones is fighting the devs, and I disagree. Why, in soccer or hockey, am I not allowed to just stand next to the goalie and goalhang the whole game? The reason I can't is the offsides rule. Am I fighting the rule makers of FIFA or the NHL? No, I am playing a balanced game that gives people a sporting chance to win. If we let any strategy go, we start getting cheap no-skill tactics like that.

I actually don't like Anti-Personnel mines either, and think they're pretty cheap too. I'd love to remove them from the game, or make them give more feedback so people have a better chance of not dying to them. But the difference is vehicles have a large cooldown and resource cost. If you mine a pad, they essentially waste resources, where you can just respawn as a player. And people can't learn to play vehicles in combat if they never get a chance to spawn.

If for a moment I agreed we should take stealth away from the infiltrator, the community would go berserk. People are invested in the game, and we can't just take a primary feature away from a class. Not to mention at the range they do most of their killing, the stealth wouldn't have a huge effect anyway.

The sunderer jammer is a neat idea, but it's not something we need right now. There are more pressing issues.

Figment · 2014-06-04, 06:38 PM

Originally Posted by Muldoon

You put a lot of content in your posts, and again, I disagree with a lot of it from a game design point of view.

You say No deploy zones is fighting the devs, and I disagree. Why, in soccer or hockey, am I not allowed to just stand next to the goalie and goalhang the whole game? The reason I can't is the offsides rule. Am I fighting the rule makers of FIFA or the NHL? No, I am playing a balanced game that gives people a sporting chance to win. If we let any strategy go, we start getting cheap no-skill tactics like that.

I would point out again that an "arbitrary off-side area" wouldn't have been necessary if the bases were designed around defense rather than "attacker wins once it can camp the box, which is as soon as it gets in range of the base".

Some of your bases have been improved, but not by far all. Had you listened to us during Alpha and beta, you'd not have to use such random band-aids now: you'd have ensured that defenders would have the distance to capture points advantage and would have non-vehicle campable approaches to those areas, while attackers would have to find ways to disable the defenders from spawning, rather than camping the box.

Your map design and win conditions usualy include "camp as much as possible", that's very off-putting to players who play defense: they'll quit the local fight. Which is off-putting to players who play offense: they either camp without skill, they lack a real challenge and worse, eventually they have nobody to shoot at all because the other party moved on (!).

This was a HUGE reason for players, veteran and I bet new players alike, to quit. The camping certainly was a huge reason to stop playing for my outfit and sister-outfits.

I actually don't like Anti-Personnel mines either, and think they're pretty cheap too. I'd love to remove them from the game, or make them give more feedback so people have a better chance of not dying to them. But the difference is vehicles have a large cooldown and resource cost. If you mine a pad, they essentially waste resources, where you can just respawn as a player. And people can't learn to play vehicles in combat if they never get a chance to spawn.

A couple comments here:

With thousands of players in an area (and especially with such low ttks), being able to deny areas to the enemy with mines or at least weakening them is important for a defender.

"Skill" is in concealed placement, denial placement, etc. No, it's not twitch aim skill, it's a tactical skill. The problem with PS2 is that it's a strategic/tactical game while it mostly provides derpy solutions: one hit kill this, one hit kill that. If you want players to die less, maybe just make everything less lethal. Allow players to respond.

The ability to detect or expect boobytraps is a skill too. Of course, with the way you designed it, detection is often too late: even if you spotted it, it often already went off and killed you. Again. This is your choice as devs to opt for really fast TTKs.

PlanetSide 1 had WAY more mines per player, but they were FAR less lethal. You are annoyed with mines in ways that I can't recall anyone being annoyed with mines in PS1. Also... We could pack as many EMP grenades as we deemed necessary in PS1. In PS2? You have to pay resources for it.

Speaking of which, your resource argument goes for the mines as well. In fact, it's likelier to be a waste since you got so few of them, they're bound not to trigger anything.

Anyway. The biggest issue to a new player in a mmo pvp environment like this is the sheer amount of threats. And you as a design team made EACH OF THEM instant death. You don't allow players to gain situational awareness. It is something I warned about during alpha/beta and maintain is a huge problem. And a huge source of frustration. Cause if you always die instantly to anything that attempts to camp, when are you going to be able to make a counter-move?

If for a moment I agreed we should take stealth away from the infiltrator, the community would go berserk. People are invested in the game, and we can't just take a primary feature away from a class. Not to mention at the range they do most of their killing, the stealth wouldn't have a huge effect anyway.

In my opinion it was a mistake to give infiltrators anything more than a side arm. I've played infiltrator since 2004. Don't tell me it's not OP to ambush people like that with low ttk weapons.

The sunderer jammer is a neat idea, but it's not something we need right now. There are more pressing issues.

IMO it's a bad idea. Why not just start with making attrition matter?

Repairs, revives and ammunition are too readily and infinitely accessible. Defenders are numerically disadvantaged, give them a meaningful logistical advantage: nerf medics and engineers and increase the reliability on equipment terminals.

And yeah, it would have helped if the dev team hadn't given every class to every player. For one, it would have made players unique. Gameplay uniqueness and pride in what they can do makes a character mean something to a person beyond cosmetics. It also makes alternate characters with alternative challenges, (dis)advantages and therefore alternative gameplay interesting. Your setup doesn't do that and I think it bores players sooner.

rpgawesome · 2014-06-04, 06:57 PM

Ok i just read the upper post and I think im one of the FEW who are going to read it in full and understand it.
Yes this game has a lot of issues that nobody sees until you realise that all of your gaming and playing was futile because when you look at the forums or hear someone complain you will notice it too.
Now what I wanted to say and I KNOW it's hoing to sound dumb but here it is:
WHY DO WE PLAY VIDEO GAMES?
Because they help us escape our bad reality/relax or take a break/or we just started playing a long time ago and can't stop playing.
DO YOU REALLY WANT A SUPER DUPER REALISTICAL GAME?
No.Why?Because this is a futuristical shooter that is probably better that most games and it's FREE.
IS THIS REPLY WORTH ANY AWNSERING THE THREAD OR EVEN MY GRAMATICAL ATTENTION?
Probably not.

Be happy with what we got.It could be a lot worse but it isn't and remember IT'S STILL A F2P game.

Figment · 2014-06-05, 04:25 AM

Originally Posted by rpgawesome

Ok i just read the upper post and I think im one of the FEW who are going to read it in full and understand it.
Yes this game has a lot of issues that nobody sees until you realise that all of your gaming and playing was futile because when you look at the forums or hear someone complain you will notice it too.
Now what I wanted to say and I KNOW it's hoing to sound dumb but here it is:
WHY DO WE PLAY VIDEO GAMES?
Because they help us escape our bad reality/relax or take a break/or we just started playing a long time ago and can't stop playing.
DO YOU REALLY WANT A SUPER DUPER REALISTICAL GAME?
No.Why?Because this is a futuristical shooter that is probably better that most games and it's FREE.

Be happy with what we got.It could be a lot worse but it isn't and remember IT'S STILL A F2P game.

Quick question:
- How exactly is this relevant to the thread?
- Are you saying consumers and users should never provide feedback or critique?
- Are you saying that one should just accept anything you get, because it's free?
- Does being "better" mean it's perfect? Does being "better" mean mistakes or potential refinements shouldn't be suggested or pointed out?
- If the objective of a game is to relax and be provided entertainment, doesn't that mean that if something is frustrating the game actually fails to deliver?

Either way, I absolutely fail to see what you're trying to achieve or what you are trying to convince people of with your message or even who you're trying to address. Worse, I fail to see the logic behind the argument (which seems to be very non-sequitur to the discussion of the topic anyway: "it's free, thus accept the game's implementation of game mechanic X/any game mechanics and combinations thereof"). :/

Mordelicius · 2014-06-05, 02:56 AM

Originally Posted by Muldoon

You put a lot of content in your posts, and again, I disagree with a lot of it from a game design point of view.

You say No deploy zones is fighting the devs, and I disagree. Why, in soccer or hockey, am I not allowed to just stand next to the goalie and goalhang the whole game? The reason I can't is the offsides rule. Am I fighting the rule makers of FIFA or the NHL? No, I am playing a balanced game that gives people a sporting chance to win. If we let any strategy go, we start getting cheap no-skill tactics like that.

Except, defense is allowed to park the Sunderer next to Capture point, correct? In hockey, are defense allowed to just block the goalpost all the time? Surely if the defense is allowed to park a Sundy to the capture point in PS2, then logically, and by rule of reciprocity, offense can be allowed as well.

I actually don't like Anti-Personnel mines either, and think they're pretty cheap too. I'd love to remove them from the game, or make them give more feedback so people have a better chance of not dying to them. But the difference is vehicles have a large cooldown and resource cost. If you mine a pad, they essentially waste resources, where you can just respawn as a player. And people can't learn to play vehicles in combat if they never get a chance to spawn.

I knew it, AI mines are next....Again its' that "hands on" philosophy that's encroaching too much on Player vs. Player space.

And AV mines on vehicle pads is just normal gameplay that involve balanced risk/rewards.
Isolated Base in the middle of nowhere (0-5 players) - Low risk getting killed by defense/ low chance getting a kill. (Why even bother going to a faraway base to just drop an AV mine???)

Medium fight (5-20 defenders) - normal risk getting killed or losing the mine / normal reward getting a kill.

Heavy fighting (20-48+ defenders) - high risk dying trying to drop a mine or losing the mine / high reward taking out a vehicle.

The reason why I AV mine pads in the first place is in, for example, Tech Plants, the ideal spot to put my Sundy spawn is just out side the NDZ which is right outside the SCU. And that pad is right behind. See how all this limitations are so tied together and so frustrating?

It's the the same with attacking Vanu Archives and one can't mine the pads. They pull out a tank and your Sundy is toast next to C. Imo, it's a very valid strategy.

Imo, the Devs are mischaracterizing/misidentifying this as the problem. The problem I see here is more of a lack of a tutorial on AV mines or even AI mines. The newbies just lack a tutorial on how to deal with mines in general, that's all and that's it.Take any PvP MMOs without tutorials, and any players will be confused, even if the mechanics are simple.

If for a moment I agreed we should take stealth away from the infiltrator, the community would go berserk. People are invested in the game, and we can't just take a primary feature away from a class. Not to mention at the range they do most of their killing, the stealth wouldn't have a huge effect anyway.

Whoa, wait a second! Snipers are different from Infiltrators!! I'm proposing removing it from long-ranged Snipers. Hence, if they have a Sniper rifle equipped, stealth is disabled. So if a regular short ranged weapon is equipped, then Infiltrators can still stealth. And oh, stealth has huge effect for infiltrators. That's why can they are mobile and can change location with impunity. There's way too much advantage and no downside at all.

I heard of a plan, according to a Higby video, to give Light Assults dual wield capability for their revamp. As a result the jump jet cannot be used while dual wielding, correct? Well, Snipers, has 3 advantages (range, stealth, 1-hit head shot). If LA jump jet will be disabled with dual wield, why can't Sniper (not infiltrator) stealth ability be disabled when sniping. Point being stealth is for infiltrators only, but for sniping, it is way stacked.

The sunderer jammer is a neat idea, but it's not something we need right now. There are more pressing issues.

It would be great if it can substitute for the NDZ instead. It's a much better mechanic.

The PS2 Generator mechanic is the best example of "hands off" approach. It's all player vs. player interaction and gameplay. There's no Dev hands preventing players from doing anything, it's all player driven.

A Sundy Jammer would have a similar "hands off" concept.

Figment · 2014-06-05, 04:41 AM

Originally Posted by Mordelicius

Except, defense is allowed to park the Sunderer next to Capture point, correct? In hockey, are defense allowed to just block the goalpost all the time? Surely if the defense is allowed to park a Sundy to the capture point in PS2, then logically, and by rule of reciprocity, offense can be allowed as well.

The analogy doesn't quite work: defenders may be subject to different rules. In the sports analogy above, offense can be off-side, defense can not be since it's their side of the pitch. Hence defenders can spawn in the spawnbuilding, but the attacker cannot. Or, in PS1, defenders could use /b in their SOI, while attackers could not.

Yet, nobody was allowed to HART in within a SOI, to prevent bypassing of the defensive lines in order for defense to have a chance. You're better off describing why equal rules should be applied in this case, than that "it's natural". Remember, we wern't allowed to place vehicles at certain points near doors in PS1, due to potential blocking abuse.

Whoa, wait a second! Snipers are different from infiltrators!! I'm proposing removing it from long-ranged Snipers. Hence, if they have a Sniper rifle equipped, stealth is disabled. So if a regular short ranged weapon is equipped, then Infiltrators can still stealth. And oh, stealth has huge effect for infiltrators. That's why can they are mobile and can change location with impunity. There's way too much advantage and no downside at all.

Only downside is health (armour/hitpoints). Snipers did fine in PS1 without stealth. I've always been of the opinion it's too easy to have snipefils run around cloaked. Same for headshots being instant kills a lot leaving too little survivability to become situationally aware for a lot of people.

It would be great if it can substitute for the NDZ instead. It's a much better mechanic.

The PS2 Generator mechanic is the best example of "hands off" approach. It's all player vs. player interaction and gameplay. There's no Dev hands preventing players from doing anything, it's all player driven.

A Sundy Jammer would have a similar "hands off" concept.

Better but not perfect either. A valid strategic target, but should IMO just be tied to control of the capture point:

Not captured = can't place AMS due to interference range, but any that had already been placed remain functional.
Captured = can place AMS
Re-captured (by defense) = Massively reset capture progress (not just stop ticker or turn ticker around, defense needs more incentive and reward to regain control of points)

I dislike the "capture point area", manually hacking it is much more immersive, can be countered and provides some teamplay cover or stealth requirements, while providing a priority target to resecuring players (a way to control if a cap goes through.

I don't think people should be made aware of a capture attempt of a point or generator until it succeeds. These points however should be in the natural movement and defensive zones of defenders, so they discover this information themselves and by simply moving around, they already cover these areas of interest (rather than that they have to cross to the other side of the base to intervene). Information on what to do next, should IMO be provided to new players AFTER it happened.

Regardless, HART and Spawn beacons should not allow harting on top of buildings. I much rather deal with people who have to work their way up, than with people who drop behind you and get a free passage beyond your defensive line.

Mordelicius · 2014-06-08, 05:40 PM

Originally Posted by Figment

The analogy doesn't quite work: defenders may be subject to different rules. In the sports analogy above, offense can be off-side, defense can not be since it's their side of the pitch. Hence defenders can spawn in the spawnbuilding, but the attacker cannot. Or, in PS1, defenders could use /b in their SOI, while attackers could not.

Yet, nobody was allowed to HART in within a SOI, to prevent bypassing of the defensive lines in order for defense to have a chance. You're better off describing why equal rules should be applied in this case, than that "it's natural". Remember, we wern't allowed to place vehicles at certain points near doors in PS1, due to potential blocking abuse.

Their only official argument is the attacker spawn should be equidistant to the defender spawn with regards to the capture point. That falls flat in two logical areas:

- Attacker Sundy spawn is destructible and defender Spawn room is not (false equivalency).
- Defenders can drop a sundy spawn in a capture point while Attackers cannot (reciprocity).

The defenders have been parking Sundies next to the Capture point for about a year now since the NDZ. The very fact that the Developers don't find that imbalanced, is further proof that the attacker NDZ is moot and should be removed asap, or at the very least for the sake of testing/compromise, limit it to 10-20 feet and see if makes any difference at all. If not, simply remove it all.

Only downside is health (armour/hitpoints). Snipers did fine in PS1 without stealth. I've always been of the opinion it's too easy to have snipefils run around cloaked. Same for headshots being instant kills a lot leaving too little survivability to become situationally aware for a lot of people.

Then give the Snipers equivalent HP. That's a not a biggie at all as opposed to having stacked abilities that's in synergy with one another ( long range + stealth + one-hit = broken/OP combo abilities). What Snipers do is stealth, hide under covers, aim, unstealth, shoot for the head. Repeat.

Hence, the stealth ability for snipers ought to be removed.

Better but not perfect either. A valid strategic target, but should IMO just be tied to control of the capture point:

Not captured = can't place AMS due to interference range, but any that had already been placed remain functional.
Captured = can place AMS
Re-captured (by defense) = Massively reset capture progress (not just stop ticker or turn ticker around, defense needs more incentive and reward to regain control of points)

I dislike the "capture point area", manually hacking it is much more immersive, can be countered and provides some teamplay cover or stealth requirements, while providing a priority target to resecuring players (a way to control if a cap goes through.

I don't think people should be made aware of a capture attempt of a point or generator until it succeeds. These points however should be in the natural movement and defensive zones of defenders, so they discover this information themselves and by simply moving around, they already cover these areas of interest (rather than that they have to cross to the other side of the base to intervene). Information on what to do next, should IMO be provided to new players AFTER it happened.

Regardless, HART and Spawn beacons should not allow harting on top of buildings. I much rather deal with people who have to work their way up, than with people who drop behind you and get a free passage beyond your defensive line.

If you think you have a better mechanic, that's good. Make a new thread and perhaps the Developers will read or respond to it. But, I'm not arguing for perfection. I'm arguing for the developer "hands off" or "hands on" philosophy. I'm saying, in the current PS2 live build, the generator mechanic is the best example of a "hands off" approach where players interaction result in gameplay.

If I were to touch a generator to overload it. The enemy side has to shoot me or mine the area to stop it. If they want to fix the generator, I have to stop them as well.

The NDZ simply stops player from parking Sunderers. There's no player interaction or gameplay. That's the point I was trying to make. Their "hands on" approach is hurting PS2. They are simply not mindful of the implications.

Figment · 2014-06-09, 06:33 AM

Originally Posted by Mordelicius

Their only official argument is the attacker spawn should be equidistant to the defender spawn with regards to the capture point. That falls flat in two logical areas:

- Attacker Sundy spawn is destructible and defender Spawn room is not (false equivalency).
- Defenders can drop a sundy spawn in a capture point while Attackers cannot (reciprocity).

Both your logic and SOE's logic is flawed.

The distance the defenders and attackers have to bridge should be proportional to the strength and capacity of either side. Since the attackers have the initiative, usualy have the firepower and the numbers, the distance and rather, the area, the defenders can realistically cover is much shorter. In fact, the attackers just need a breach, while the defenders need control.

The problem is that both you and SOE look at these groups as being equals. They are not. One of the groups bring combined arms to lock down a base, the other has nothing but infantry and maybe a few vehicles (that die within seconds).

The defenders have been parking Sundies next to the Capture point for about a year now since the NDZ. The very fact that the Developers don't find that imbalanced, is further proof that the attacker NDZ is moot and should be removed asap, or at the very least for the sake of testing/compromise, limit it to 10-20 feet and see if makes any difference at all. If not, simply remove it all.

This is a non-sequitor. Yes, the defenders have been parking them there, but the need for defenders is also greater. Your main complaint is that defenders can do something attackers can't. In a way you're right, but NOT in the way you think: neither side should be able to park it right at the CC! Why? Because the CC shouldn't actually be that close to the outside environment. It is simply too easy to dominate with vehicles.

But what I don't get is that you complain about Sunderers being able to get there, while it is far more problematic that Liberators and tanks can control the paths to the CC and lock it down.

If you think you have a better mechanic, that's good. Make a new thread and perhaps the Developers will read or respond to it. But, I'm not arguing for perfection. I'm arguing for the developer "hands off" or "hands on" philosophy. I'm saying, in the current PS2 live build, the generator mechanic is the best example of a "hands off" approach where players interaction result in gameplay.

If I were to touch a generator to overload it. The enemy side has to shoot me or mine the area to stop it. If they want to fix the generator, I have to stop them as well.

The NDZ simply stops player from parking Sunderers. There's no player interaction or gameplay. That's the point I was trying to make. Their "hands on" approach is hurting PS2. They are simply not mindful of the implications.

Whether it's hands on or off doesn't matter. What matters is whether the assignment they give to players is feasible for both sides. Both sides (attack and defense) MUST be able to perform these interactions.

It is for instance quite clear to me they didn't really know how to relate base size to defender numbers. The initial base size has been kept, despite tasking defenders with covering far too many approach routes, thanks primarily to the mere addition of a jetpack.

They designed bases and mechanics, assuming players could cover these things, without realising the amount of coordination and logistics required to do perform these tasks. The amount of defenders required to cover everything is simply too large and these populations are not available. Nor did they seem to have looked at the scenarios of what kind of strategies players would employ to win.

Given the designs and mechanics, camping the defenders was sometimes not only the easiest, but sometimes the only feasible way to win.

One of the problems with these base designs is the linear thought put into it, where oftentimes it is assumed attackers and defenders both start at point X and Y directly opposite to one another and will fight an equidistant distance to control points A, B and C. And maybe D, E and F. In reality, the vectors of attack vary constantly, while the vector of defense do not. Yet the bases were designed around defense against a single vector of assault and required concentrated defense to even hold that.

The same problem exists for counters. Counter-type warfare shouldn't require more numbers than the amount of units attacking. This goes in particular for air cover. It is far too easy to kill AA MAXes as a Liberator crew, to the point that I once killed 9 in two runs, while they never got us down to 20% health, simply because they had too many threats to deal with (both airborne and on the ground). They were dedicated to fight us, yet were made so much weaker than us it would take m a minute to kill us, while we could target ANYTHING on the ground and could kill in one shot or at most a few seconds.

They simply don't understand that dedicated platforms should be extremely strong because you can't afford to have many dedicated platforms in a combined arms game due to the sheer variety of targets while you can only use them against a narrow section of enemies, while jacks of all trades should be weak as you can afford to have many of these and can always use these in any given situation.

Too many players argue from a sense of entitlement, or worse, something I will call "convenient realism hypocrisy" (i.e. they argue something has to be "realistic" the moment it suits them, while they ignore this realism argument for everything else irrealistic that they're fine with). The only thing that matters is game balance, function and that it should result in a competitive environment where everyone stands a chance to perform the job they're assigned to do (ie. what the game mechanics and missions ask of them to create a "win", i.e. win at attack or defense, regardless of population).

Stanis · 2014-06-08, 05:28 AM

Originally Posted by Muldoon

I actually don't like Anti-Personnel mines either, and think they're pretty cheap too. I'd love to remove them from the game, or make them give more feedback so people have a better chance of not dying to them. But the difference is vehicles have a large cooldown and resource cost. If you mine a pad, they essentially waste resources, where you can just respawn as a player. And people can't learn to play vehicles in combat if they never get a chance to spawn.

Can we get a clear indicator - or make it impossible - to deploy mines in an area where they will blow up ?
I must say I get annoyed putting them further and further away from a vehicle bay so they don't go boom.

It's just as annoying having your mine wasted as a vehicle.

On that note - in many cases a player is pulling a vehicle away from a fight. That means they can take the time to CHECK the vehicle pad.
Vehicle blows up once - you take the hint. Sometimes I forget to check but there are a few players that obviously know the auto-drive routes and put them down perfectly.
This seems perfectly fair play to me. The trade off between time to check and actually bothering to do so .. not to mention the likelihood and frequency of spawning vehicles.