Intro Planetside got nice graphics especially within the day/night circle. Detail - on some places on Amerish you will even see butterflys Also there a modern FPS mechanics implemented What the game needs is tactics! Person A and Person B having a conversation! A What is actually missing inside the game? B Tactics! A I don´t understand aren´t there different tactics to capture a specific type of base for example? B Sure but those tactics were created based on the current metagame. B What we need is a change of the tactics within the metagame! This a 4 step plan to improve the metagame These are some ideas that I have already posted in my other thread that We need to add/change in game The main goal is to make the game more tactical - changes that are necessary cover: Step 1: Basic Game Mechanics Vehicles HUD Performance - Features REK check Grief Bases Step 2: A Combination of the current Hex Adjacency system with the lattice system Lattice Neutralizing Territory Neutral Zones Neutral Zones offering new options! Denying enemy lattice benefit Outcome Lets take a look on Esamir Special case Lattice-System and Resources Step 3: The change to the Metagame by implementing Searhus When Searhus is added into the game Sanctuaries Lattice-System and Resources in global strategie Adjusting Resources and making them worldwide The downwards spiral Lattice interstellar and later worldwide Complexity needs a lattice Step 4: Sandbox game Reimplement the 4th Resource Auraxium Sandbox Items Outro Step 1: Basic Game Mechanics Vehicles Implenenting the driver/gunner system: Making the MBT´s at least 2 man tanks would reduce the vehicle spam by 50% Actually it would be less then 50% because teamplay would be needed then. Instead of grabbing a tank solo you have to get your buddy on your big gun! In that context: Experience: needs to be shared equal to numbers of persons inside a vehicle with the exception of the Galaxy and the Sunderer Making the liberator a subject to the availability of the tech benefit: Liberators are heavy machines as we know so they have to be only available if tech benefit is available! Assault buggies: I know they are announced but make sure the SG is working proper compared to the sidegrade of the lightning (SG-cannon). Galaxy Cargo: Allow galaxies can transport small vehicles Loadstar: These are not only handy to transport vehicles but also an oppurtunity to fix the imbalance between the advantage of the magrider taking the high ground with the afterburner function compared to the vanguard and the prowler. ANT: Bases are powered by generators which are fuelled by Nanites will have a specific NTU-Level (Nanites) which is to some extent slef-sustaining but depletes when the base is damaged, ie turrets, generators and to a lesser extent vehicle terminals. If a base goes down to 0% Energy it becomes neutral and hackable for every empire. To refill the bases you have to get an ANT and fill it inside your warpgate and then take it to its destination to refill the base or supply neutral bases. HUD Copy and paste: Inside the chat make tab for the killspam there should be copy and paste available. Since the most cheaters are using names with small L´s and big i´s combined they have names like lllIIIllIIIIllIIIIooLLLiiiLLLUUUUuIIIIllll. Since it is only possible to report people by typing the correct name this function would be very helpfull. Tactical overlay need the following options: - show all empires - show mixed empires - show specific empire The minimap needs: - a zoom factor function - stretching image function - moving it around on the HUD - an option to make it brighter (So much reading I need a break - filmed and edited by Bullenbeiser (-=Ruffnex=- TR Miller)) [youtube]
Performance - Features Rendering: Every unit needs the same render distance. Unimportant things are not getting rendered at all! For example randoms that are somewhere behind a wall or far away. Q-spotting: Remove it from game totally! This goes hand in hand with rendering. Platoonmembers are spotting people by rendering them - they become visible on the Radar. Every other Information about enemy in coming from TS, ingame voip or chat. Big enemy concentration can be seen on the tactical overlay Techplant base design before was causing rendering issues if only the important positions would be shown for you on your HUD your system would have handle less information about troop movement (friendly and enemy). What is important to see? - All of your platoonmembers - Everything that is spoted (rendered by a PM) and is in range of your minimap (radar) - Those spoted enemy appearing as little red dots on your radar What is unimportant and pretty much useless? - Randoms (only show dots on minimap if they are in range) - Remove all the annoying blue and red triangle they are not usefull - This includes that you will not be able to "wallhack" anymore (use the radar instead) Im pretty sure that removing spotting and changing rendering system will be a performance boost for the game! Squad experience sharing: Fighting side by side with your squadmates rewards you with leaching 5% from the pool of experience points that someone else earns for getting a kill. In a Full squad with every member inside the same zone you will share 55% to your teammates and collect 45% for yourself. Kill Assists: There are 3 ways to get kill assits: 1. Geting a assist from the kill where somebody else made the most damage and you made 2nd most damage (already ingame) 2. Getting assistent kills for every kill your gunner inside the vehicle does (already mentioned before - vehicle XP sharing) 3. Getting a kill assist where you have revived somebody or repaired his/her vehicle or healed him/her or the person has spawned at your AMS or resupplied ammunition from you and then that person goes on to make a kill. Clearly heals and or repairs from friendly fire or damge should not generate an assist and as a preventation against exploiting gaining XP from a resupply should only grant XP if the receiver has previously gained a kill. Following on from that you will receive SEP (support experience - what has the same value then normal XP) for each kill the person you have supported does untill he dies at which point the link between you and him/her is broken. Give us more and less airpads: (based on thoughts by Germanius (-=Ruffnex=- TR Miller) Add some extra airpads inside the warpgate to prevent crashes, as an emergency fix just copy and paste the mainbuildung complex 3 times On the other hand remove some airpads on the battlefield to create longer resupply route for aircrafts. That goes hand in hand with bringing back the loadstar as a support vehicle for the aircrafts. Furthermore aircrafts will not get ammunition at the Airpads of the Ampstation and the Biodome. Aircrafts can be pulled there and land but won´t get ammuniton! Aircrafts can only get ammuntion at: - Techplant - Airtower - Loadstar - Warpgate In the context of aircraft supply implement different types of twr´s with different design: 1. Airtowers - Airpads 2. Guntowers - Extra defense turrets 3. Watchtowers - Extra tall REK check Implement new certifications for the cloaker make hacking more spezialized Also the cloaker has to choose if he is getting claymores or a REK REK certifications - hacking...: - Terminals - Turrets - Vehicles - Infecting Base System Grief I already opened a thread about this topic in the past Grief Bases Main Generator of a base: Controls everything inside the base - the spawns, vterms and airterms! Also if the main-gen is offline this breaks the link and interrupts the benefits which would otherwise be provided via the lattice. This makes it possible to instantly cut the technology (or bio/amp) benefits from an empire. (im talking about lattice and cutting benefits later in step 2) That way the attacker has to bring all vehicles (with the exception quads) from somewhere else. The high pressure on bases can actually be cleared by the defenders by making a massive push on the enemy AMS - without them instantly being able to spawning a new one locally! Initiating a hack (ghost hacking protection) 'There is a specific amount of people necessary to initiate a hack after the hack is on the people can go away from the CC but this will slow down the hack time. Hack times will still be influenced by the surrounding hexagons. How many people are necessary to initiate a hack? Outposts: 3 Towers: 5 Bases: 7 Satellites: 5 Base-Satellites: - Can be hacked anytime - Not depending on Hex Adjacency or Lattice - Got a vterm that only spawns flashes - Provides 0% influence - Providing a "safe" spawn point in comparison to an AMS Satellite CC´s are special since they are not depending on Hex Adjacency or Lattice the take over is going very fast to take control of a satellite you need to have 5 trooper next to the CC for 30sec! If you got less then 5 trooper at the CC because one died the hack stops! (Hex Adjacency or Lattice what is that??? Keep on reading or you read to much already then listen to the music) [youtube]
Step 2: A Combination of the current Hex Adjacency system with the lattice system The Lattice will not force linear fight as you would actually think when we are talking about lattice. Its limitating the enemy to 1-3 options for his next step but also provides backhacking! The lattice system works alongside the normal adjacency system which is already implemented inside the game. But to hack an actual base you need to have a link from another base (lattice) and influence from an surrounding hex. Warpgates provide the initial links to the bases - from there bases are linked with each other. What does the lattice do? The lattice is limitating the choices where an empire could attack. This is creating frontlines! On the other hand it will be possible to drain bases and with that backhacking. So lattice gives you a better overview of what could happen next. Within the current system everything could happen! There is no strategie or something you could read out of the map. Without lattice the VS can just push straight to north from hvar. All the way up to sauvra and then take it. With lattice they would have to take Dahaka first or they would start a drain at sauvra. Indar lattice Red lines = TR basic link Pink lines = VS basic link Blue lines = NC basic link Green lines = Home base links Yellow lines = Addtional bases link Orange lines = Extra link provided by techplant Home Bases (2) would be for: TR: Sauvra and Mao VS: Peris and Hvar NC: Rashnu and Tawrich Addtional Bases: TR: Dahaka VS: Allatum NC: Peris In each case 1 home base is linked to one of the additional bases while the other is linked to a techplant and linked to 1 of the additional bases of the enemy empire. The additional bases are linked with each other. Esamir lattice 2 home bases - the amp provides the link to techplant amp and bios are connected in a circle Amerish lattice 2 home bases both connected with the techplant The techplant are connected with each other There are 3 sidepasses (orange) Neutralizing Territory Neutralizing territory is a hard job and not rewarded except from the fact that the zone you are in will go neutral and that way hackable for your and every other empire also you have to think about getting an ant or even better you actualy took one with you inside the cargo of the galaxy you came with. Furthermore there needs to be a system to initiate a drain the szenario of becoming a decent drain. To start a drain you need the minimum amount of 12 people to get it started. Example of how a system could work: In my example i am talking about 12 spots at the main-generator which can be close to each other important is that trained engineers can use a tool to cause a bypass or short-circuit in the electricity of the facility (outpost/twr) this will increase amount of energy which is getting cosumed in a specific time. To reastablish the electronical network of a facility in with that the ability to use terminals again it is necessary to get 6 engineers to the generator to solve the problem. Whatever system you design - make sure it cannot be used by single person - a group of people is necessary! Slow draining: Bases have a auto-repair function - if terminals, turrets or generators are destroyed the base would consume energy (Nanites) to slowly repair itself to means that destroying things in bases will speed up the drain. Damaged bases would drain slowly of it's own accord, but not as fast as a base in which the electricity is sabotaged! Also it effects the ability to use terminal from any kind by disabling its disfunction. I could also imagine that spawned vehicles would also using a small amount of energy for their production. (suggestion) Showing NTU levels on the map: The map needs to show the exact NTU-Level of a specific zone - for example: Mao Techplant - NTU 56,37% When the NTU level of a zone goes down to zero the zone goes neutral. Neutral Zones Neutral Zones are a tool to make backhacking possible and also denying ressorces (talk about that later) Important to know is that only the zones which are inside a cluster can be neutralized. Cluster: Cluster are the surrounding hexagons of an facility, bases providing benefits to the cluster!
Neutral Zones offering new options! Option A (the normal way): NC got a link from Dahaka to Allatum also they control one of the surrounding hexes. Option B (drain outpost): Outpost would have a smaller amount of NTU then bases so they drain faster. Once a hex has become neutral it is hackable by every empire. Since there is no surrounding hex the influence is at 0% while the hack. Once it is captured and if your empire has a link from the lattice you will then be able to hack the base with the small amount of influence you gain from the single hex. Also you can start to capture surrounding hexs. VS can use the neutral zone to get the ability to hack Dahaka Option C (drain a base): Draining the base only and hack it afterwards will be possible but you will have 0% influence which brings Option B back in the game. Option D (in a normal fight) Also it is possible to drain a base which is heavily defending by the enemy by clearing the CY and taking control of the silo. To make such defense possible bases need to be designed more like the biodome - that is with protection from vehicles. I'm very pleased about the tunnel system that is to come and I'm very pleased for every little space you build that seperates vehicles from Infantry (exception the fury); I hope that these spaces are huge and i would love to see some big halls and the main-generator moved into the basement. Denying enemy lattice benefit There a 3 ways to disturb the enemy lattice: - hacking the base - taking down the maingen - neutralizing the base
Outcome The following picture shows a situation on a battlefield: (Don´t get confused by the picture keep on reading this picture is coming later again) What is to see? TR is controlling 5 bases. Dahaka main generator is offline. The Dahaka and the Allatum cluster is without technology benefit! In the next example Hvar main-gen is online Allatum is providing tech benefits to its cluster. The golden marked hex is not in the influence of a main facility - technology is unavailble! Bases are providing technology benefit for twr´s over 2 hexes. Special places like "The Crown" can achieve technology up to 3 zones Therefor you have to also contol a supply line of hexes to provide technology NC is controlling the Crown in this example - they already got tech from zurvan but just image this from the view of the TR. TR would own mao and hex 1,2 and 3. Hex 2 Palisade would be caputred by the NC. Hex Adjacency would cut the techlink providing Mao to the Crown Or in this example is VS in control of Heyoka and the hexes untill the Ascent. If NC would take hex 1 or 2 between The Ascent and Heyoka " Hex Adjacency" would be involved Normally the NC could spawn MBT at the blue circle satellite since satellites can only spawn flashes and because of the lattice - hexcluster system the have to spawn their MBT at the red star. The VS could spawn MBT at Peris itself or at different locations to flank the NC If a spec ops team of the VS would kill the main-gen of Tawrich the NC would have to spawn their MBT inside the Warpgate or around Zurvan because of the Mao tech NC will have no tech benefit at the frontline untill they reastablished the power of the facility! Lets take a look on Esamir Esamir is special because it got only 1 techplant thats why Eisa is the only special place on Esamir In this picture is used a link that doesnt actually exist in my suggestion i changed the lattice on Esamir Ampstations will provide the "technology links" and not the biodomes (i tried different lattice before) First i created the Lattice with the braun lines and later i choosed the one with the yellow lines Which bring us to Esamir Lattice So if the NC would control the hatched zone They could get tech outside Eisa at the red star but not further SE If Eisa Generator goes down the only place to pull armor will be the warpgate In this example TR got tech available at every yellow caro Special case Facility A and B are linked to each other Empire 1 wants to hack facility B but empire 2 has hacked facility A already => the link is currently cut empire 1 has to resecure the CC of facility A first! Empire can hack out tech-vehicles from enemy techplant as long as the main-gen is up. It also possible to hack out tech vehicles at enemy bases which are linked to enemy tech lattice.[/b] Lattice-System and Resources: The lattice system is also responsible for the resource flow. If the supply line is cut the total ammount of incoming resource will get lower. Resources have to be real time or very short tickers - every 5s/10s/30s By taking down specific generators you will deny the enemy resources by not letting him produce in this Base Cluster. After all that reading you might now understand this picture better then before you started reading Dahaka generator is offline => TR resource income from Dahaka- and Allatum Cluster is not functioning
Step 3: The change to the Metagame by implementing Searhus When Searhus is added into the game In my examples Auraxis is a solar system continents are planets Activate the warpgates so people can move their vehicles to other planets. Open the seazones which are currently all out of bounds to let spec ops gals happen. Sanctuaries Empty the warpgates of buildings and create sanctuarys instead a place where you can organize RAIDS! The following video will explain what a RAID is. These are no fake gals nearly all of them are full! [youtube] Sanctuaries should also contain a shooting and a vehicle training/testing area. Sanctuaries provide links to the 3 homeconts and they in turn provide the link for the benefit continent (in the middle) Im using planets instead of continents in my example (easier to draw) I would like to see some cool benefits in the future Taking over a enemy homecont gives you access to all their technology! Later when we got more continents (i hope it will be many) implement a 2nd homecont for each empire. And then we also can go back to the Planet Auraxis with continents connected with seazones... Lattice-System and Resources in global strategie: The lattice system is also responsible for the resource flow. If the supply line is cut the total ammount of incoming resource will get lower. So if the NC would have sabotaged the VS homecont so that there is no link to the bases they own on Searhus (in the middle - green) They would loose all the benefits and all Cluster from the involved bases would stop producing ressources. Adjusting Resources and making them worldwide In a normal situation an empire controls its homeconts + around 1/3 of Seahrus - that is about 1/3 of the world. Adjust the income of resources to: - lower when you control less then 1/3 of the world - normal when you control 1/3 of the world - higher when you control more then 1/3 of the world What shall that mean? Image you would be on Indar and control 1/3 of the territory your income is "normal". With changing the system you will control more - you will have like i said 1/3 of the world. The adjustment makes those 2 pools equal by reducing the income for single hex. So in total need to control 1/3 of the world to get out the same resource you would get for 1/3 of Indar in the current System! The downwards spiral It will happens often that 1 Team will be double teamed. That will cause a downward spiral from resource income for this team. To prevent from a too hard downward spiral i suggest to increase the pool for resources from 750 up to 1500. And later when there is worldmap with tons of continents to increase it even further! Reason for this is that if one empire is starting to be in the downwards spiral it will have a buffer to make some pushes anda change on the battlefield to prevent from being stuck into it! The worst scenario is that your empire is push back and becomes ZERO base. In that case you would have no incoming at all. Therefore there has to be a basic incoming all of the time not much but a few Ressources getting always produced in the Sanctuaries. Lattice interstellar and later worldwide A Lattice is not something that only exist within a continent, it is the main element of a global strategie! Broadcast functionality: A broadcast is available when the are no gaps in your latice BC makes it possible to warp directly from the sanctuary to planet 2 for example. This brings the factor location inside the game and shows another side of the lattice system. 1 solar system - 10 planets - 2 homeconts for each empire - 4 benefit continents Image Indar would be a homecont for the VS In this example for a solar system with 2 homeconts for each fraction and 4 benefits continent. The TR and NC have full control of their lattice system while the VS they have trouble in their lattice links. because some smart, brave TR Soldier made all the way to Indar and destroyed the maingenenators of Peris and Hvar and with that disabled the warpgate functionallity for the fishheads. In correlation with the instellar view TR would have to sabotage both homeconts to cut the lattice fully! So they would at least take down 4 main gens in total to cut the lattice of the VS however the distance to travel is far and would take some time and organisation. The planet marked with 1 is partially controlled by vs and would provide broadcast functionality for planet 2 but the lattice system is disturbed by TR. VS have to fix at least 1 generator on their homecont (Indar is a homecont in this example) to get broadcast functionality back! Also it is possible to break the enemy's lattice by taking down main-generators at specific pointsor even taking over ownership of specific bases. This leads us to... Worldmap from Planetside 1 lattice in beta 2002 (10 continents) http://3.bp.************/-rEigkcSOoOE/Tv3PHmWqSzI/AAAAAAAAAr4/Az49Ax78pZ8/s1600/Planetside_map2.jpg Complexity needs a lattice At the point a system becomes complex it has to be connected via a lattice! Image when this game has grown and then finally we will have back the planet Auraxis with 10 continents on it! The blast would be adding more planets to get a solar system or even more awesome an entire universum
Step 4: Sandbox game Reimplement the 4th Resource Auraxium Auraxium was in the beta just use a similar system for it and combine it with the Lattice It will be used to place Sandbox Items! Sandbox items are in the need of a specific engineering certification And depending on the size of item you will need more or less resources and manpower Sandbox Items Ideas based on the thoughts of Groany from Outcasters (Miller TR): Regarding the size of the base it would have a number Build Points put on stratiegic locations, along walls, on top of buildings, spawn rooms, air pads, etc. A series of smaller structures, machines and such would be pickable from a list that appears when interacting with a point to build there. The list would contain stuff like: - Extra turrets - Infantry ammo dispensers - Small (2-3 man) bunkers - Small (2-3 man) towers - Personal shield regenerators - Reinforced wall sections Outside of bases it will be possible to create different type of items: - Bunker - Tower - Gates (with shield gen) - Walls - AA-Flak - Minefield Outro In the end Metagame is what you make out off it! (of whom is he talking about? Don´t know maybe both?) [youtube] This post was mainly created and edited by Psychophonic (-=Ruffnex=- TR Miller) Big thanks to all that helped creating it!
I just wish people stopped throwing terminology around that they do not understand. "Metagame" being one. This is all gamedesign related and has little do to with metagaming. Applying tactics isn't metagaming either, but it can become a metagame if it is played out in a sphere beyond the actual game. So, a metagame is a game that is played beyond the actual game. Here is an example: 5 PS2 players all work at the same place in RL. Two colleagues are Terran players and three are Vanu. They spend time during workhours to mess with eachothers heads in anticipation of the real game. Between them, this becomes a game of psychology. It is based on PS2 but it's not actually playing PS2. This is a metagame. That said. I respect anyone who puts this much effort into anything and I respect Ruffnex, so you can regard this reply as a bump. Just please stop calling it metagaming, because it isn't.
Read [MDMI] Psychophonic with a better layout by clicking the link Thread in -=Ruffnex=- Forum with better layout
Allow me to disagree. Metagame may the the game outside the game but it can also be said to be the game above the game. This includes stuff like outfit organisatrion, inter-outfit alliances and cooperation, the strategic game and the linkage between cooperation and strategy. However, back to the topic, great topic psycho. There are great ideas here and I hope the devs at the very least are already thinking about some of this stuff.
I fail to see how the lattice system would make the game more involving and anything less than just linear whilst also lobotomizing the various strategic options on each map. People fawning over the haylcon days of PS1 seem to forget the reason for the lattice system was in part due to their being a drastically lower player cap per server and without it there basically would have been no battles.
I only agree with the fixes. I don't think a huge redesign into the lattice format is going to benefit anyone. So Yes to a better minimap, a better tactical overlay and a copy and paste function but No to everything else.
I think the drive gunner thing isn't going to happen and I'm quite happy with MBTs now. maybe even more of a buff on the secondary gun would help. I like most of this, however If I'm a honest it does seem a bit too much like 'make ps2 like ps1'. to answer above comments I think the stuff about benefits and resources and linking via the lattice is exactly what is needed. wihtout this we have no spec out gameplay. I'm not sure we need the lattice focus the fight though, and tbh the fights are too big already so I think they need spreading more rather than focussing. Whenever you see 'enemey platoons detected' that basically means enormous, unstoppable zerg detected. so yes to lattice for benefits but no to lattice for controlling hacks. I think something needs to be done about the baility to hack all the way around a base though. this renders setting up base defences pointless. the main other issue that struck me from these ideas were the global resources. I think this could easily lead to a whole empire running out of resouces. at least now you can go to another continent to get more.
I forgot about the ANT. You basically brought up a lot of the good points from PS1. Sadly, they are trying not to make this PS1 Version 2. Though, a lot of good points were made. I didn't make it past post 2 though. To much reading. haha.
PS 1 is dead and your now a official old gamer yearning for the "orginal game" - you get a Card like the one Sheldon has for "Justice Leg of america" (Says - i played PLanetside 1 : 5 years) PS 2 is just persistant version of Battlefield. The day you jumped in your tank and could gun and drive told you that. We can call it - Battle-Side? or PLanet-Field? They destroyed the Meta game and turned into a zerging grind. They never played PS1 or they just didnt care? blah blah blah whatever. blah blah blah What??? The game will die out until another battlefield game comes out....until then Google "imgur NSFW" and click away.
You can also read this via Reddit and the Ruffnex Forum just follow the link. Inside the Ruffnex Forum the layout (i timed out while posting it - 30min to edit) Also there is a Summary and every Item clickable. http://redd.it/171p4u
Nice asking for thing on the ideas but to save space I sniped allot from the quote and used the numbers to break apart my reply. Yup Planetside was designed to look good and that is it. The asthetics and gameplay took a back seat to screenshots and 15 second youtube action clips. Sorry but you are stuck with a twitch game, the only tactic you need here is shoot for the head and jump around so they cant headshot you. We already asked for that, Got told a flat out NO! Sorry but looks like we are stuck with (1/2)Prowler/Vanguard/Magrider for the rest of Planetside 2 life. Agreed the lib should be a "tier 2" vehicle but as of now the only the MBTs are "Tier 2" Besides the Libs are not as powerful as they were in Ps1 since they cannot hit infantry outside of rendering distance. (some wierd quirk with the game engine that will more likely than not be changed) Would like to see our favorite buggies back including hte thresher and marauder but they are talking about an across the board buggie with rumble seats. Probbibly going to be stuck with THIS instead. Definatly missed those but as of now the only Tier 1 land vehicle they can transport is the flash and lightning so there really isn't a need for vehicle transport yet. Also they cant go through warpgates right now so not really needed for vehicle transport. See above Would like to see them return but don't think they will make a generator again or anything that will shut down a base again (least they try to get their players to try and maintain the base for their empire) .I would like to see ANT resource conveys that will have to be defended as they go from base to warpgate. We will see what happens. I like that idea. Be kind of hard to do with out a right click in tab/alt mode. Would like the option to go back to the last killed by panel so you can read a little more on who killed you and what they killed you with. As of now there is no mixed empires like the old overlay. I miss the detection and grid squared tactical overlay. I used to be able to tell which square was a BFR and which could be a GAL full of troops from those overlays. Allot with the HUD I wish it was more sandbox instead of fixed. Come to think of it most of the game feels mroe fixed instead of sandbox (which makes me susepct a Ps4(Playstation 4) port for this game but nothing that can be confirmed in naything other than rumors.)
