The Dismal Science: Economy Thread 2

I support this idea, and so I'd like to take a shot at defending it. About the interesting things this adds to the game: it adds tactics. With limited resources comes risk, which creates a need for conservation of one's limited resources. This forces squads to play with tactics to conserve those resources, eg. encirclement and destruction, as opposed to a zerg which wastes massive resources in endless vehicles and infantry gone.

Basically, the whole game deletes its current meta of zerg and overpopulation wins, as they are unfeasible, to make interesting fights with tactics, which are feasible. This is just one way this would massively (IMO, positively) change the game.

Also, about your argument that this is an attempt to reduce infantry AV use and C-4, you can't just claim these things and expect people to believe you. "I mean come on!" won't get people to believe you either. Explain why exactly this system would cause such side-effects.

(BTW, I'm not sure if more expensive C4, and therefore reduced C4 usage is even a problem. Even though its expensive, vehicles are also more expensive, meaning they are pulled less. Less C4 to destroy less vehicles is pretty balanced, IMO.)

It's understandable if you don't have the time to read something like this. More importantly though is the implications that arise from you not reading his argument and making your own arguments against it. Since you're making assumptions about what he's talking about, and your arguments are based on assumptions, you may very well be attacking nothing if your assumptions are wrong. It's always important to read or hear all what another has to say before jumping to conclusions, right?

Anyways, this resource system reduces the overuse of everything, preventing zergs and overpop from being a deciding factors in battles, since they can't just overwhelm smaller forces. They're now limited by their available resources, which will deplete quickly with overpop. A whole new meta is made by this, basically a whole new way of fighting in the game, which IMO adds fun since fights become interesting and not grind-fests. That would benefit you, wouldn't it?

See, you don't understand the OP. I do.

Sherman is one of these millitary-loving guys who wants Planetside to be more like a real life simulator. He want's logistics. He wants realism. He wants people coming up with game plans before they engage in battle. He wants people sitting around waiting for vehicles before they Redeploy into action. He wants a slow, plodding, boring thing. To him that's fun, I get that. But it's NOT for everyone.

These changes absolutely force people to play Planetside2 his way. And when you say stuff like "It prevents overuse", well you sound like a politician because that's just another way of saying "This prevents you from playing the game the way YOU want to".

The system we have is far superior. Because IN HIS OWN OUTFIT, he can do all those things he wants. But the rest of us don't have to.

Am I wrong here? No, I don't think so.

Nice try. The only thing keeping vehicles in check right now are that infantry CAN "overuse" things like C-4 and AV launchers. Sherman knows that. You know it. I know it. And we all know why he's trying to deploy this ridiculous "economy" idea 3+ years after launch.

Maybe. Either that, or this was an idea he had before and seeing as how the economy is going to be fundamentally changed in the coming months, he saw it as an opportunity to pose it again, considering it fits well with the new mechanics. The problem with vehicles right now is that they too cheap, do not scale in expense when more people use them, and because they are cheap to pull, they are pretty weak overall. Creating a system in which the in-game economy can be manipulated in favor of balance is better for overall gameplay.

You obviously don't understand the OP, your little strawman there makes that clear enough. And of course, I'm not surprised at all that you'd be the kind of person to fear what you don't understand. It's too complex for you, so you're just going to fling excrement at it until it goes away.

You're still missing the fact that it cuts both ways: with operating costs, vehicle users won't be able to overuse HE cannons either. If they try to just sit outside and shell a base into submission, they'll run out of ammo and the vehicle zerg will implode. And when you kill their vehicles, they won't be able to replace them endlessly.

Similarly, aircraft won't be able to just rain rockets and shells from the sky all day. They'll start running out, they'll have to fly further away to rearm, which will give the ground units more breathing room and more time to set up AA.

Zergs steam rolling down a lattice lane will run out of steam if they don't stop now and then to build up supplies for the next push, which will give the other side time to pick themselves up and get organized. It will result in fewer unstoppable zerg rolls and more dynamic, back-and-forth fights.

That's what makes the unified economy unified: it affects everything, everyone uses it, everyone contributes to it. As I stated in the opening post, this is a second look at an old idea. One that, when the construction system gets here, we will be halfway to realizing. We will have the resource, the harvesters to collect it, the structures to use and store it. All that's left is to tie it all together into a dynamic system that reaches every corner of the battlefield.

But hey, at least this is keeping my post on the front page where people can read it.

So when players can't do what they enjoy because "economy", then what??

I mean seriously, this is a terrible proposal. And I don't care if it stays on the front page for a year, I'm pretty sure the Devs aren't taking this serious.

But like everyone who posts an idea, you cannot accept criticism of it.

Pull from the warpgate? Everything is still more accessible than they would be in BF4, where everyone has to compete over a limited number of vehicles.

Spam of any sort makes the game less enjoyable for everyone. Making resources count means there is less spam, which makes kills more rewarding. Less spam from one base means vehicle zergs get split over multiple approaches or must have a strong infantry backbone to project force forward. It adds value to pretty much every aspect of the game.

Then they just have to find a way to work around it. It would be part of the game's challenge. For example, they could find a base that can spawn what they want, and then find a way to transport themselves to the location they want to fight at. Complaining that you can't do what you want right this instant because you used up your resources is like complaining that the respawn timer keeps you from playing while you're dead.

Everything you've brought up so far has been either completely baseless, off-topic, or already addressed. I'm not sure what you're expecting "accepting criticism" to look like, considering your "criticism" has consisted of "I don't understand this so it must be witchcraft".

Aside from some of the pricing, I think it's a good idea. Just think about a Sunderer with 5000 resources while a single infantry guy could potentially pull away 1% of the total capacity for a non-resource heavy infantry guy such as a Medic. That might sound low, but that means you can only respawn 100 times there... In a 96+ fight and an average lifespan of 3 minutes for infantry, it would mean that the Sunderer is dry within the first 5 minutes.
I would also make sure that most vehicle prices would remain below a certain point. Vanilla MBT's could even be half the resources (2250 cortium) of a full MBT, and only a few select vehicles could rise above their original resource cost (Wraith Flash's). This could encourage the use of lower-end upgrades which are currently barely used since they would cost less cortium than the things that are used 24/7 right now.

I also think that you could decentralize the whole system a bit. Rather than Sunderers having their own Cortium with them, Sunderers draw Cortium from the nearest friendly base on the lattice link (or potentially the nearest Silo). This means that pulling Sunderers, and Sunderer destruction, isn't an instantly disastrous problem for your bases Cortium.
What's more, you could allow ANT's to resupply the nearest base by uploading Cortium into the Sunderer, rather than having to drive all the way there. That improves teamplay for harvesters. Alternatively loading up a Sunderer with Cortium simply means the Sunderer doesn't draw from the nearest base for a time, which might be better for the game as a whole.

Also I think that there should be something like "personal cortium". You shouldn't have to pay your resource limit for buildings that you collected the cortium for. So as long as the cortium is in your ANT, you can build buildings with it without it costing you your resources. Place it in a Silo and the amount will gradually decrease as the Silo powers modules etc, but for a time you can still pull the resources you put in without it costing you anything from your resource limit.

What seems fairly absent from this proposal is the rewards for the harvesters. These people put time, effort and occasionally their lives in the balance, all so that their allies can keep fighting and earning stuff. What if one guy financed the entire assault? If one guy delivered 100.000 cortium total that fueled an entire 4 hour 96+ battle complete with tank forces? What does he get? How do you measure his input, his importance? How much XP, certs, ribbons and special rewards (cosmetics and the like) is that player going to get? I would personally give them a temporary resource limit boost at least, and a resource gain boost as well. And that's just the start.

Also, your idea seems based on me pointing out how the resource system and cortium could be married. Any special thanks or references you would like to make?

The prices are definitely purely hypothetical, and I don't think I'll be able to nail down any definitive pricing structure without extensive testing. I can definitely see the upside to back-loading vehicle's costs more in order to provide a bigger "newbie discount" though.

As far as harvesting resources, that definitely should provide some kind of XP on delivery. Maybe something like 1 XP per 10 or 20 Cortium deposited (so a full haul would be 1 or 2 certs). Or, since it can technically be spent straight from the ANT, the reward could be split to be half on harvesting and half on delivery. However, that's something that just needs to happen whether the unified economy is implemented or not. Which is kind of why I overlooked it, I just took it for granted that of course there would be a reward for harvesting.

The Sunderer situation is a little tricky. I like the idea of Sunderers making back-and-forth trips between the front and the nearest ammo tower to deliver ammo, but I also recognize that it's not the most practical situation for AMS work. That's why I proposed giving the AMS a base-link for convenience, but letting ammo sundies haul the old-fashioned way. Which is also why the number was so low: so that it wouldn't dent a base's supply much more than a tank, and because that pool is just for vehicle ammo (so then it's just a question of whether 200 AP shells per trip is enough). I suppose just making all sundies run universally off a base-link would be more consistent, but less engaging I think.

As far as being able to spend whatever you harvest, on the one hand it does make sense, but on the other hand it seems like it might be a bit hard to keep track of. Though one workaround I can think of is making it so that harvesting (or depositing, if we want to make it less exploitable) Cortium also refills your Nanites at the same time, and allowing it to "overstock" your Nanite reserves with the excess decaying over time if you don't use it, kind of like how overheal works. That way instead of having to keep track of which bits are set aside just for you, the act of harvesting resources also gives you permission to spend them. And the "overstock" would make sure you don't get stiffed if you go on harvester duty while your reserves are full.

And yes, I remember we talked about linking the two resources before. And then I realized I could take that and use it to bootstrap my old global economy idea.

Dude this doesn't add anything to the game. You somehow don't get that. This forces a slowdown in gameplay which you label "tactical", but it's just going to feel boring to tons of people.

Maybe if your system was limited to vehicles only, I could get on board. Because they are the only real problem with resource abuse currently. But the idea that I can't even play the freaking infantry class I want if I "use" too much economy? That's a total non-starter.

This is a fantasy sci-fi shooter. You get that right? Making things slower or clumsier or more boring isn't going to help anything. You are trying to transform PS2 into your vision, and it's sad you can't even admit that.

See? Busted. This is what I mean. That's BORING! Planetside 2 is about getting into the fight and having fun as fast as possible. For some reason you think that needs "fixing". This isn't a milspec shooter and you need to accept that.

So far, more tactical choices is interesting and give PS2 a deeper gameplay, especially for outfits. I won't comment about numbers and all of those things, as it will be a serious headache to balance everything properly, even if it can be tuned finely.

Instead of this, I prefer pointing what the people behavior may become. About this, I kind of understand the point Reclaimer is trying to... gently elaborate ? Anyway it appears to me very grey in the end.

Good points :
1- More tactical gameplay, considering the management of resources.

• a) for personal usage, it would become even more important to chose the right loadout for the intended battle.

• b) On a bigger picture, outfits would focus much more on vitals stations. As capturing a single base away from the main lattice may be more a waste of resources than a advantage (for tactical position and/or Victory point bonus).

2- I dare say that it would reduce Team Killing a bit. As it would cripple the resources of everyone, including the TKers. Especially about vehicles TK considering their cost in comparison to infantry.

3- Possible use of cheaper means. Valk for example, instead of Gal drop.

4- More solidarity. "Hey buddies, take a ride in my sundy, don't spawn yours. Save the planet Cortium".


Bad points :
1- More downtimes for everyone who cares at least a bit for resources

• a) Choosing the loadout could take a lot of time if you're really going to spare resources. It's a lesser drawback for infantry as they can change their loadout easily, but for vehicles, it's even more a goto on multi-purpose guns. And I'm not even talking about Platoons redeploying. If every leader have to weight the cheapest solution in each case, I'll sleep even more in those groups. Taemien already have almost 10 loadouts, he would go 27 with this.

• b) No control over the big scheme of things. Lonewolves would go wherever they want, even if outfits try to secure only the most important bases. Overextension could then deplete an entire pool and you won't be able to do anything about it.

In the same vein, every person who doesn't care about resources will play as we are playing now. I'm afraid of reactions from anyone who is playing carefully to not spend too many resources, seeing how this guy and any other just wastes the pool of Cortium.

2- On the contrary, griefers would have a bigger impact, as they would now cripple the resources too.

3- Cowardice. I already see heavies defecating in their pants when it's about going out the spawnroom to travel 15m without any cover to push back. I'm afraid it would be even worse while resources will be taken into account. And heavies won't be the biggest matter.

How about people who pull a very costly vehicle if it get blown up 2 minutes later ? The counters are still there, more numerous and cheaper. The vehicle game is already a bit slow, and especially boring, when ground sits behind rocks/buildings, and air just come, unleash hell on the ground and flee. I don't see many players taking the risk to push in the breach, to stay and make things move. Considering how fast they can be obliterated I don't criticize this "safe playing", but resources would make it even more common. Boring being the point of Reclaimer, and I concur.

4- Probably more segregation too. I already see a lot of sundies empty and locked, and MBT without gunner, just because they don't want gunners to ruin their trip (stealth, player shooting at anything, etc). I can understand this on some situations, not many really, but the expenditures on weapons and ammos could intensify this behavior.



Apart from the balance in terms of costs, it would require tons of modifications to the core game to make something viable. Like loadout modifications for vehicles (as many threads already pointed out), better roles for the different loadouts (specialized weapons cheaper, but effective in their role, as it should already be. And I'm not talking only about vehicles here. Battle Rifle says hello). Every little thing that works in a situation or another (Sundy taking Cortium from bases or not, etc). Better options to select permissions into vehicles. With all that I wrote which could possibly change the behavior of many people, in good or bad, very propably in both ways.

Also, I'm not really sure about the place of urrent Certs in all of this. It gives more flexibility by buying more stuff, but what about the cost if you upgrade everything to the max, just to be effective, because you earned a legit experience using your tool/vehicle/potato launcher ?

It sounds to me like : "This idea is cool and all. But we don't know if it will really work with the actual community. And it's a freaking headache. So nope."

On a new game I would support this 100%, as the game could be build around this system. But here, I doubt it would be beneficial, but probably detrimental.

It adds tons to the game!
Let's look for an analogy: Ammo packs.
We currently need ammo packs to keep your ammo up. This is a tactical tool that helps keep the game more cohesive, it creates dependancy. Not an extreme amount of dependency, but it's there. Removing it would mean that everyone would need infinite ammo.

The resource system as described would add a new layer to the game. This isn't some new weapon to kill or gain advantages, but something that can be an advantage and disadvantage at once.
Just think of it as a resource system like in RTS's. You could go for an Uncle Sam idea where every player gets a set amount of resources every few minutes, or you could allow players to use harvesters to get Tiberium, gold, metals, supplies or whatever fancy resource you ask for. This gives both players advantages and disadvantages. By harvesting more you can build more than your opponent, but your opponent might target your harvesters and reduce your income. It's a tactical layer to the game that improves it, and so will it improve PS2.

Where does it say that? You can play anything, as long as the base is kept supplied. If you don't, you have to spawn at another base. This makes it everyone's problem to keep it supplied, protect the harvesters, create resource routes etc.

Depends on how you do it. This doesn't necessarily make it slower or more boring, especially if the resources need to be collected in contested area's to keep the bases alive. This creates a hectic environment where one superior force could be starved from resources to win, or where an inferior force could deliberately use up all the resources in the base to buy time while the opposing force has to replenish it.

S

Not busted. It's a find system.

Oh what fun. While we're add it can we add delivery quests, and gnomes, and maybe STORMWIND?!?

Seems like a pretty good idea to me. The resources for bullets thing might be a little over the top but the idea of adding economy and making territory control and ownership impact how the players do things is great. You could even have a supply and demand system where areas in need of cortium are flagged up on the map so that you can take an ant and manually resupply them.

That creates a lot of new 'types' of fight where you have escort scenarios or ambush scenarios when resupplying.

Maybe for free items like normal ammo let the engineer carry a set number of ammo boxes which cost cortium, they could then resupply troops indefinitely. It will make it so engineers don't just spam them everywhere but have to give at least a little thought.

If that's really what the game is about, why do we have continents? Why do we have the lattice? Why do we have vehicles, which by their very nature require you to leave the fight, pull them, and drive back? Why are we getting the construction system? Why do we have classes? Why do we have respawn timers, which take you out of the fight every time you die? Would you remove all these things?

The kind of game you describe can be easily achieved by a single arena, not more than 100m on each side, with an assortment of obstacles. Give everyone an identical character with a single weapon that has an infinite magazine, and every time they die have a dynamic spawning algorithm that instantly places them within 15m of a hostile player, just around a corner so it'll be a surprise. Set the run speed to about 40 km/h, set gravity to about 1/6g, enable bunny hopping and give them a wall jump. Recommended game mode would be free for all deathmatch. Bam, nonstop, uninterrupted instant action. That's not what Planetside 2 is though.

What the economy adds is metagame, something I've seen a lot of people ask for, especially PS1 vets. It adds an extra layer for advanced players who want to go beyond the mundane cycle of spawn, kill, die, repeat, and it gives platoon leaders more advanced options than "redeploy and rush A". Someone who wants to remain meat in the grinder is free to do so, but if they don't pay attention and don't practice a little basic map awareness it might just take a little effort for them to get back to the front. That extra effort can lose a fight of course if the enemy isn't having the same problems, but that's called being outplayed.

You've made it abundantly clear that you don't want metagame of course, but that just highlights how simple-minded you are. Honestly I'm not even sure why you play PS2, so much of it is already anathema to what you claim to like. Wouldn't COD, Quake IIIIA, UT, or the DOOM beta be better for fast-paced, infantry-only instant-action? Some of those I bet even have instant-respawn servers running.

Now you are taking me out of context and being insulting. So you'll be reported. Calling people "simple minded" is against the rules here.

I want a metagame, and I want tactics. But there is such thing as TOO much of something. And your suggestion here pushes this game far far over the line in my opinion.

You have fun with that, I'm sure the mods are just brimming with goodwill for you and entirely willing to give you the benefit of the doubt.

Metagame and tactics necessarily subtract from high-adrenaline instant action, because both of them require taking time to stop and think. Metagame and tactics are all about encountering things that would prevent you from doing what you want, and using your noggin to overcome them. They're also about turning the situation around, so you can prevent the enemy from doing what they want (ie, foil their tactics). So you've made it pretty clear that, in practice, metagame and tactics are not what you want. You claim to want the label, but vehemently oppose every detail of the substance.

Feel free to contribute something constructive whenever you want. Or you can just keep embarrassing yourself, and I'll use your persistence as an excuse to bump my thread while your behavior does an excellent job of making people very reluctant to side with you.

Okay you're right.

So when do you think this awesome idea will go live? I mean everyone loves it clearly, so it's going live right?