News: Implants Delayed due to Feedback - Page 4

Slackermagee · 2013-07-18, 10:15 AM

Originally Posted by o Solei o

I really don't understand all the hate.

Essentially implants were utility-slot style consumables that you could also acquire with Smedley Coins.

Price point seems to be the issue. If they are super-cheap, they make an effective nickle & dime revenue stream for the game, a good source of cheap cert purchases, and a good cert sink for late-game players. If they are super pricey, they generate lots of community grief and nobody wants that.

As to whether they were OP or not, I would really like to see people calm the hell down and let PTS actually test and balance things, instead of just screaming the moment the first pass hits test that it's broken and horribad.

Well, there are two mechanically imbalancing things about implants. The first, is that the imbalance of power between new and old players would have been greatly worsened. We're all in the same server, there's no avoiding the BR100s. You can kill them as a BR1, it is imminently possible but unlikely given the balance of power. With the implants that already tight overlap of 'chances to outplay someone with better kit' would have been shortened considerably. Mainly by sensor shield. The high BR players would have the consumable certs to always have one on. The low BR players would either deal with it, or get nickel and dime'd.

The second thing, is how ruinous they would have been to how the game operates right now. Spotting, radar, and minimap awareness are so key. Having an auto-spot implant when you are damaged, an implant that erases you from the minimap when radar is in play, a series of implants that ignore commonly used grenade types in building clearing offensives... that was going to be terrible. That was not a change many of use were looking forward to at all.

This leaves out the implications of P2W too, this is just the mechanical stuff that some of us had objections to.

SixShooter · 2013-07-18, 03:25 PM

I'm really glad to see that they were able to hit the brakes on this one, especially since the choice to do so was based on player feedback. It wasn't really a terrible idea but the some of the implant ideas were a bit too much and to implement using SC is just a bad idea IMO.

Rolfski · 2013-07-18, 04:24 PM

Originally Posted by Stomps

lets hope they dump them completely

That would be a bad design decision imo. It's an MMO so any additional option to personalize your character to your preferred play style would be in potential a welcome addition that deepens the game play.

So implants are good on paper, they just need to put better thought into it:

Make them persistent, rental systems that keep asking for your certs/SC to stay competitive are just frustrating money grabbing mechanics.
To prevent this game from becoming p2w: If you can buy them with SC, they can never be upgrades, only side grades or convenience/cosmetics items.
Balance them out better, some of the current ones on PTS sound pretty OP.

SixShooter · 2013-07-18, 04:39 PM

Originally Posted by Rolfski

That would be a bad design decision imo. It's an MMO so any additional option to personalize your character to your preferred play style would be in potential a welcome addition that deepens the game play.

So implants are good on paper, they just need to put better thought into it:

Make them persistent, rental systems that keep asking for your certs/SC to stay competitive are just frustrating money grabbing mechanics.
To prevent this game from becoming p2w: If you can buy them with SC, they can never be upgrades, only side grades or convenience/cosmetics items.
Balance them out better, some of the current ones on PTS sound pretty OP.

Totaly agree. If done correctly they can be great for the game. They just need to be reworked (sidgrade instead of upgrades), and they need to be implemented in a better way.

EvilNinjadude · 2013-07-19, 04:04 AM

Now that we've got all the negative feedback, thrown it at the devs, and the devs have heard us... No better time to collect all the positive feedback and suggestions!

Originally Posted by Rolfski

Make them persistent, rental systems that keep asking for your certs/SC to stay competitive are just frustrating money grabbing mechanics.
To prevent this game from becoming p2w: If you can buy them with SC, they can never be upgrades, only side grades or convenience/cosmetics items.
Balance them out better, some of the current ones on PTS sound pretty OP.

...aaand I think that covers it all quite well.

Except for some people who added the idea that persistent implants could be bought Per Loadout, so that paying players will dump more certs (as they will likely use more loadouts since their implementation last update.)

Sonny · 2013-07-19, 04:32 AM

Pretty amazing work by the community to push this one back, it was really the first time I really feared for PS 2's future. Way to dump on the competitive gaming aspect of PS 2 by giving richer players an advantage.

I watched the 'Paying to Win' presentation by Ben Cousins of EA (who worked on Battlefield Heroes) and was pretty horrified by his blasé attitude to the concerns of his community that paying for power-boosting items could kill the game. So what if you get more cash for it, going down such a route is only worth it if you have no interest in creating a fair, competitive game. I doubt that many players have respect for Battlefield Heroes now.

Shogun · 2013-07-19, 05:45 AM

too many things wrong with the implants, and smed didn´t say anything about WHAT they are going to change.

will they change what implants do?
will they change them to permanent implants?
will they make them battlerank related instead of smedbuck buyable?

i am not convinced that they will make the right decisions (all three together).
especially when smed interferes...

Carbon Copied · 2013-07-19, 07:14 AM

The issue with Battle Rank linked implants is that there's the increasing number of people already at BR100 so it's just an instant "pow have instant access to all these boosts that Joe BR1 doesn't" ok you can argue that it's that BR "privilege" but it's nothing more than a very tenuous carrot on the stick in all honesty; if they turned round and revamped the BR's to actually mean something per class then I could about roll with it but seeing as there's no (apparent) plans of this then it's very unlikely. Overall very boring and lacklustre system.

I think to make it "fair" you have to look down the route of them using resources (and integrated to the upcoming resource revamp maybe re-introducing Auraxium?) and a potential time sink of combining them. It'd be interesting to see something along the lines of a trade skill/combining implementation of them where they're combined at the various tech/bio/amp stations (call it the implant lab area) giving more value to the POI's both in a defense and attack element. The implants themselves being persistent (but only one at a time applications) yet high resource costing.

This could also bring in a new style of play for more "spec ops" where players that like that sort of thing have the ability to sneak in outside lattice links and destroy these "Implant lab areas" in the complexes breaking the supply of them to the opposing faction - industrial espionage.

It's only an idea however its a potential solution that might solve who gets what reasonably fairly. It probably wouldn't sit well with SOE as it's not a cash cow to milk as easily but you can turn to other things like combining boosts or something along those lines I guess.

Polar North · 2013-07-19, 08:01 AM

I kinda jumped for joy when they delayed the release of the implants, and personally I think they didnt think it through AT ALL.

In my opinion they shuld totally overhaul the implant system, make it another customisable option that u can buy for certs, that add a constant passive ability. Obviously theyd have to redesign all those 100% chance of blocking flashbangs etc. (maybe reduce them to 5% or something) and the health regen (maybe make it 5 seconds till it kicks in, and reduce how fast the ur health regens).

Dunno, just my opinion, just think the more customisable ur character is the better

CraazyCanuck · 2013-07-19, 08:07 AM

Bringing back Auraxium would give them an opportunity as CC said for further mission variance. Throw in a lab/mining complexes for Auraxium and we just added a new alert variable, added another tactical target, and would make getting boosts even more attractive so SOE would make more coin off it on top of improving the game.

With the lattice though, not really any possibility of going behind enemy lines and snuffing our a faction's Auraxium supply as we'd still need connectivity to take out any generators controlling the process.

Though they could take this as an opportunity to create underground mining complexes that are not lattice oriented that would be an infantryman's wetdream for combat. Topside influence could be as much or as little as they deemed fit. Multiple topside entry points at each of these complexes could be fought over, with/without the implementation of no deploy zones.

Spawnbeacons would be nadda. Sundy's nadda. All spawning would be facility only unless they implemented ventilation shafts to the surface at varius points to allow for squad beacons. These ventilation shafts would be hotly contested. They could "instance" these complexes which may give them the opportunity for different environment effects. These different environment effects may not be completely debilating but more of an annoyance that could be avoided if someone certed into envirosuits particular for that complex.

There could be several control points related to the process, each could also have shield gens on top of the control points.

1.) Control center for the mining bots.
2.) Ore processing center.
3.) Transfer Station
4.) Power Station with multiple generators that could be destroyed to disrupt the interconnectivity relays, jumpads, teleporters, fast tunnel transport between each station and center.

Sky's the limit. :P

Carbon Copied · 2013-07-19, 10:08 AM

@Crazy Canuck: I like the sound of your game. Scheduled ETA?

I like the development of the concept for sure, there are after all alot of mountain side doors around Indar and Amerish that aren't being used yet - I'm sure theres room for a couple on the other continents too

the ideas could get pretty high in the sky like you say. End of the day I'd like implants to somehow take the game forward with the birth of something new; perks/implants/traits whatever you want to call them have been done to death through other franchises, why not make them an actual part of the game?

I'd rather wait several months for it to be done right and with some innovation behind it than some re-hashed, copy and paste generic FPS lacklustre bolt on.

CraazyCanuck · 2013-07-19, 11:31 AM

@ CC

Kickstarter perhaps??

Add in a fun turn on it too. Say you get all your ducks lined up from the mining bots up and a faction has everything under conrol and all that's left is say a final timer on the transfer station which has to be calibrated to relay the resources to your WG. Enemy insertion team, instead of trying to disrupt the process, breaks through to the Transfer station control room and hacks the relay terminal while holding off attempts to retake it. If the insertion team is successful (reach end of hack timer) They receive bonus xp/Auraxium, and their faction gains the control of the complex and the Auraxium until control is disrupted. Faction that was in control, has only one option while this is going on and that is to regain the control room as the Insertion team hasn't technically gained control of the complex yet and they can't blow their own shit up. Once the hack goes through its open season again.

I also have ideas for taking over and/or neutralizing WGs but's it's off topic

Dodgy Commando · 2013-07-19, 11:49 AM

@Crazy Canuck: I like where you are going with your concept.

Sounds like a lot of work to implement though (mainly the art assets, also insuring they do not interfere with performance).

Here's an idea based loosely on your concept:
- The facilities are placed on the continent like any other facility.
- They are not part of the lattice. Instead they are based on the Hex system.

This way we can promote spec ops as these facilities can be attacked, even if there are no lattice links, provided your faction owns a Hex adjacent to the target facility.

Work in an Implant system tied to the facilites, and you now have legitimate targets that can hacked behind enemy lines without rendering battle flow chaotic as before (in theory, I don't know what anyone else thinks about this).

Just a quick idea off the top of my head. I haven't really worked it out in depth.

Perhaps make implant effects incremental, based on how many of these facilites you own (without making the maximum bonus cap OP). This way you can aid/hinder your allies/enemies, giving smaller or specialised outfits a new tactic to gain an edge for their faction.

As for Implants themselves, I'd go for the per loadout basis that has been suggested before. Have them cost certs with limited slots for equipping them (possibly as low as one slot). Not sure if they would also need a re-equip time or not, I don't see any issues with this, implants being a new slot within a loadout (thus interchangeable like any other itme in the loadout).

Then again, I could be encroaching on module territory with all this. It feels a tad similar to what Core Combat brought to PS1.

CraazyCanuck · 2013-07-19, 03:22 PM

@ DC - lost my initial response as we lost power here.

Yes would be a lot of work to implement. Artiscally I thought an instance instead of tying it in with the open continent would be easier to pull off. Not sure, just basing this off of experience with previous MMO.

Yeah exactly. Not apart of the lattice and the ability to participate at these facilities tied to the hex system.

A few things come to mind when you suggest to tie the implants directly to a facility. I think one option is that each facility provides a distinct implant(s) for the faction that controls that facility. All players have 1 slot to choose an implant, with the selection based on which facilities they control. These implants need to be powered, and in turn an Auraxium cost will be deducted for each time interval of use (1 hour??) Loose the facility, immediately loose any implant provided by that facility or loose it at the next power cost interval. A timer for switching out implants will also be required though minor, considering the chaotic nature of how quickly implants can switch hands. There will be an immediate powering cost upong choosing an implant. If you do not have the Auraxium, the implant powers down.

Other ideas that stem from this. Each implant could have a base power. A boost could be implemented based on the number of these facilties within a faction's control (easier to manage) or (tougher) a secondary synergy effect either chosen by the player based on the facilites in a faction's possession (though a lesser effect if that same implant power was chosen as a primary implant) or automatically assigned based on which facilities are controlled. For ease of management and simplicity I would opt for the straight but minor boost to the implant's power.

Edit: Never played PS1, but based off what vets have described I think I would have really enjoyed it.

SternLX · 2013-07-19, 05:48 PM

Originally Posted by Assist

Originally scheduled for end of April, hopefully they make it before 2014.

Guess we're just spoiled, expecting content updates for an MMO!

Inb4 Esamir delayed.

Yup, catch 22. Players expect Roadmap items to be completed and then other players whinge and nash teeth when its about to go in so they pull said item.

PS2 Devs can't win for loosing with this playerbase that seems to have a Median age of... 13-16 years old.