News: Sunderers will be the new spawn.

CutterJohn · 2012-09-11, 12:45 AM

Read it here.

Gals will still have spawn functionality, but it will be locked deep in the cert tree.

So. Now we will see if we were right.

Hey guys!

Spawning logistics have been a hot topic on the forums lately, and it's a subject that we care a lot about on the dev team as well. As usual we really appreciate all the feedback and ideas from you guys. We've been following these threads really closely, and I wanted to take a minute and talk about some of the changes we have in progress for this (extremely important) area of the game.

Right now we have two ways for you to set up forward spawning locations. Squad spawn beacons and Galaxies. We're going to give you guys one more, the Sunderer. Along with this change we're going to do some things to hopefully redefine and expand the roles of both the Sunderer and the Galaxy. These changes aren't going to happen over night, but within the next 2-3 weeks you should see them mostly completed and up to beta.

Sunderer changes:

Repair and Rearm functions of the Sunderer are going to be stripped, by default it'll be a 12 man transport vehicle
Repair, Rearm, Respawn and other cool toys like Blockade Armor (which allows you to drive through gate shields) will all be certifications for the Sunderer which unlock loadout choices. Which functionality you want to have with the Sunderer will be up to your loadout, you'll be able to select one of these benefits at a time.
Cert costs for each of those three options will be relatively low, meaning getting a Sunderer to be a mobile spawn point will be pretty easy
Further certifications such as deploying a cloaking field, stealth so it doesn't show up on radar, etc. will be evaluated to see if they're needed.

Galaxy changes:

By default, Galaxies will no longer be able to deploy as spawn points, but they will still be able to deploy into equipment terminals. Note: Terminals moving to a certification/attachment is a future possibility, but at first they will be available by default
Spawn tubes will be available for the Galaxy as a high level Galaxy cert, it will be expensive and far down the advancement tree. The thought behind this is that dedicated Gal pilots will be able to use the spawning functionality, rather than EVERY pilot. Some limitations may be implemented to keep the eventual "everyone unlocks everything" effect from making Galaxies the defacto spawn tool.
Other possible certification / loadout enhancements to the Galaxy include adding the ability to load a vehicle, have "powered" hot drops (drop pods), and allowing squad members to spawn into the transport variant while it's in flight.

Global changes:

Coming in the next patch MAXes will no longer be able to be spawned directly into, you'll have to go to an equipment terminal and in the following patch they will have a cooldown and resource cost as well. That means that you will not be able to spawn MAXes at Galaxies, Sunderers or squad spawn beacons. MAXes will be available at the equipment terminal on gals, but we may end up limiting that as well down the road, we'll make a determination on this based on beta further beta feedback.

Our goals with this are:

To make ground based forward spawning the primary forward spawning method and therefore enhance the importance of the ground vehicle game.
To put some limitations on the current degree to which Galaxies allow attackers to bypass defensive chokes.
To give hot drops and blockade running more tactical relevance, cause they're awesome.
To layer some additional role choices into our support vehicles.
As always, we're looking forward to hearing your feedback and looking forward to getting these changes out to you guys to play as soon as possible!

Thanks,

Whiteagle · 2012-09-11, 12:59 AM

My God, it's like they read my mind!

...Or maybe they just read my thread...

Sunrock · 2012-09-11, 01:38 AM

Originally Posted by Whiteagle

My God, it's like they read my mind!

...Or maybe they just read my thread...

Not only yours but allot of players have requested this in allot of different threads.

CutterJohn · 2012-09-11, 01:42 AM

Originally Posted by Sunrock

Not only yours but allot of players have requested this in allot of different threads.

Yep. It has been one of the more vocal issues. And frankly surprisingly popular, at least with people who frequent the various forums. I'd say about 90% approval of one form or another.

Though with this change I really hope they change the price of galaxies and sunderers. 200 for a spawn is cheap. While 400 for air transport... Thats pretty expensive.

Gugabalog · 2012-09-11, 01:52 AM

Yes! Ground ops ftw!

khord · 2012-09-11, 01:57 AM

Love this idea. The more specialized they make everything, the better it is for everyone who wants to specialize

Sunrock · 2012-09-11, 01:58 AM

Originally Posted by CutterJohn

Though with this change I really hope they change the price of galaxies and sunderers. 200 for a spawn is cheap. While 400 for air transport... Thats pretty expensive.

Hmm I don't know... It's not that you're going to loose it quickly. And it's not going to be used like this.

Flaropri · 2012-09-11, 02:15 AM

I have the sudden urge to attach boomers to my Sunderer.

Anyway, interesting changes afoot.

Phayz · 2012-09-11, 02:21 AM

Im wondering how this will affect the ammo resupply. I already spend more time driving to a battle than firing my prowler because they run out so quick, then its quicker to die and repop a new one than to try and find a rearm station. The ammobus helped a lot on the when they were about but if that functionality is getting taken from the standard issue one then i hope they do something else to rebalance. Tanks with no ammo are not fun.

Canaris · 2012-09-11, 02:23 AM

I for one definitely think this is a step in the right direction, once you see all the crazy places people have been managing to park the Gals into as the spawn point it needed a big change, not to mention almost every Gal pilot became afraid to use theirs as a troop transport and hot drop people.

PhoenixDog · 2012-09-11, 02:40 AM

Thank Christ. Always hated the idea of Galaxies as the mobile spawn.

typhaon · 2012-09-11, 03:58 AM

I'm eager to try it out. This is going to shift a lot of focus to the infantry/armor part of the game...

These bases are a BIG... and with people already adapted to trying to find 'safe' spots to park galaxies... I think it's going to be like looking for a needle in a haystack to try and eliminate spawning sunderers. It'll be almost pointless. By the time you find 1... 5 more will be parked and spawning nearby.

Everyone grab a sundy and charge!

CutterJohn · 2012-09-11, 04:39 AM

Originally Posted by typhaon

I'm eager to try it out. This is going to shift a lot of focus to the infantry/armor part of the game...

These bases are a BIG... and with people already adapted to trying to find 'safe' spots to park galaxies... I think it's going to be like looking for a needle in a haystack to try and eliminate spawning sunderers. It'll be almost pointless. By the time you find 1... 5 more will be parked and spawning nearby.

Everyone grab a sundy and charge!

Yeah, this was one of the devs fears in the dev chat they had on saturday, that since EVERYONE has access to one, they are just going to be spammed everywhere.

At least with the gal you had a high cost cost, individuals inability to fly, and the fact they cannot be reliably hidden as barriers.

I've a feeling sundy spam will become an issue with as dirt cheap and widely available as they currently are. They'll probably have to limit them more, somehow.

Canaris · 2012-09-11, 04:55 AM

Originally Posted by CutterJohn

Yeah, this was one of the devs fears in the dev chat they had on saturday, that since EVERYONE has access to one, they are just going to be spammed everywhere.

At least with the gal you had a high cost cost, individuals inability to fly, and the fact they cannot be reliably hidden as barriers.

I've a feeling sundy spam will become an issue with as dirt cheap and widely available as they currently are. They'll probably have to limit them more, somehow.

PS1 had an area limiter in place, where you couldn't deploy another AMS if it was to close to one already deployed.
Maybe something like that could work

Ghost Runner · 2012-09-11, 05:03 AM

Solution seems simple enough create an alternate sundy (use same model) as a mobile spawn that will then cost more and require a special certification to unlock and use. Just my 2 cents.