[Suggestion] The Ultimate Combined Arms Gameplay Thread

Finally getting around to posting ITT:

OP, you have a solid grasp on the game, and you have suggested some pretty dramatic changes, most of which are really good. I definitely approve of your thoughts on Infantry. HA are absolutely way too good and well rounded. Most health, most ammo, most utility, AV capabilities.... why run anything else? They have become too strong... plus they are the only class with secondary weapons.... AV launchers.

With respect to launchers: I don't think it's realistic to make launcher ammunition cost resources. Rationed launcher ammo will result in Air and Ground vehicle dominance unless the cost were extremely low. It could be something to look in to maybe for higher end launcher types. Unfortunately this could also lead to momentum issues. Trying to break out of a sanc-locked condition without vehicles is hard enough as is... imagine no AV capabilities. That's just something to keep in mind. Another option would be to see carrying capacity nerfs and limits in the amount of ammo resupply for HAs. I don't know if those are necessarilty good ideas either. A third option would be to move AV weapons away from the lock-on style to one of skill. Using lock-ons should come at a high cost... minimal damage output.

Air balance:
Your aircraft thoughts are a bit unique and could do a lot of a good for the game, but I have a few small gripes (being an air-focused player myself).

1. Liberators do not need more health, and that doesn't really solve the issue of them not being allowed to participate in larger fights. Even with double health they would be poor in large fights. More health would also increase their OP state in small fights and spawn camping. You said it yourself, they are slow and big targets. Why not reduce health, reduce their size, and make them more agile or some combination of the above? I'd prefer to see more skill brought in to liberator flying because honestly the most skillful thing a lib pilot does these days is decide when to run and which approach to take to hopefully not get zerged down by a striker team or 2 vanguard shells. The pilots don't have the tools or counter-measures available to participate in these fights, even if they are the best lib pilot in the game... which is saddening.

2. I don't think ESFs should have their afterburner capabilities nerfed just for equipping rocket pods, and only allowing A2A ESFs to keep them in their current state isn't a good idea based on one strong belief I have. I don't think the outcome of a fight should be based solely on what you brought vs your opponent (rock/paper/scissors). That afterburner advantage would be overwhelmingly huge for the A2A ESFs to the point that it wouldn't even really be fair. A2G ESFs would have a really hard time defending themselves.

Small bonuses for different loadouts would be realistic however.

I would like to see directional damage from ESFs being significantly reduced. ESFs kill tanks way too fast from the back, and I'm quite honestly surprised this has never been changed.


edit: And on a side note, I think a lot of the A2G issues are due to the inability of ESFs to kill other ESFs. Back in beta when we could kill eachother very quickly there weren't as many of us flying around. If another ESF was around, you were on edge because they could wipe you out in no time flat. There weren't any of these 3-5 clip dogfights. It was 1-2. If SOE would stop nerfing rotary weapons in order to attempt to force players to use the stock weapons that would be a good start. Instead embrace it and buff the stock guns.

Rotarys since late beta have had their damage reduced significantly and also round velocity. Both of those are huge issues. Stock Vortek Rotaries and Turbo Lasers with the old standard clip size could 1 clip ESFs, and those were much much smaller clips. The TR Rotary could basically put an ESF on fire... and we're talking STOCK clip sizes. These days for the most part I don't even engage enemy ESFs because it's not worth my time. They just burner back to their wall of AA, and I do the same. We just mutually go about our business. That's as big of an A2G balancing issue as any.


Here is an old video I made in late beta basically describing the issue. It contains footage of pre/post patch footage. Now TTKs are even worse. This video could never be more relevant than it is now!



Don't make fun of my skill brah.

I'm not sure what real life has to do with this game. Who cares what infantry can do in real life; this is Planetside, where fun gameplay is what is important.

Nobody is arguing that tanks are completely useless. A good tanker can survive and get plenty of kills. They can sit in the second line and fire at range and still be effective. What is under debate now is whether that is how we want tanks to be used. The question is this: in their current state, can tanks fulfill the role we intend them to?

If we decide that their role is fire support, then the answer is yes. If we decide that their role is supposed to be breakthrough, then I'm pretty sure we can agree that the answer is no.

Wonderful reply and it's nice to get another pilot in here who really knows the ins and outs. I don't know to much about Air, because I don't have the frames to fly, so it's really helpful to me when skilled pilots comment on their thoughts.

1. Your video makes a lot of sense, and after thinking about what you said the logic is sound on the patch reverts for air changes and things like that.

2. For Liberators, what if we gave them a longer flare time or more advanced flares like the C-130 Specter Gunship?



For instance having them able to deploy flares in short bursts whenever need be for a certain number of times? Liberators are pretty dang big so shouldn't they technically be able to carry more flares? A burster max may kill them over time, but rocket spam posses a much bigger threat on a quick death. On making them faster, you could add a somewhat faster base speed and making certing into the afterburner more fruitful? Also what if the lock-on/ ESRL's cost a minor amount of resources, but dumbfire rockets for the standard which everyone has access to were free so everyone would always have AV options available?

Lastly, what did you think on the large radius proximity bonus XP circle for guarding Liberators and Galaxys?

Just awful

.... It has been done.
Trust me..... It only worked once or twice, but it was done.


Similar things have happened from the rumble seat of a flash.... From an actual flash detonating C4 with its fury at point blank.....

I'm glad that dumb scenario hasn't happened to me yet *knocks on wood*. Seriously though, blowing yourself up with your own C4 should turn you into permanent giblets forcing respawn.

Not your own C4.... The C4 your team medic threw on your butt as you cloaked and ran into a capture point, unaware of your own status as a guided missile.

You sir are a monster

I am a man with a medigun.

One thing I wanted to clarify on Armor piercing rounds. Currently they do barely more damage than HEAT, don't you think they should be buffed a little damage wise if the tank armor buff is implemented?

You forgot to mention SMG's and infiltrators.
You forgot to mention the LA shotgun/C4 spam

But you remembered to **** over HA by saying taking C4 is a choice.. yes it's a choise.. no medikits if you do that. I'll never carry c4 on my HA, there's not enough good medic on my server who has that good reflexes.

I never said that taking C4 over health kits was a great choice, just a choice I've been seeing used much more frequently.
Mostly when I play Infantry I'm in a Max with other infantry around so I never encountered a large amount of Shotgun Spam that kills me. I will say that the LA's shotgun spammers down a max really fast in the open though. I covered C4 Spam in my thread, just not shotgun spam. I don't own a shotgun in game and my friends don't complain about getting owned by them a lot, so I wasn't sure how to talk about them in great detail without sounding like I didn't know what I was talking about.

This is however a combine arms gameplay discussion thread, and I would greatly appreciate it if a high BR, such as yourself, with plenty of infantry gameplay experience would highlight all your current issues in a detailed format though. Thanks!

By the way Sebastien, I know you're an avid tanker. Do you have any thoughts on the issues and if the suggestions I posted would address them?

Only reason I haven't posted in this thread, is because all the issues I have with tanks, were covered by your opening posts.

Awesome post. Thanks for the nice words you sent me privately, I am glad some things I have posted in the past were of use to you when you made this write-up. I agree with most of the things in it and we need to seriously voice our opinions on the combined arms aspect of this game or else it will continue to become Infantryside 2.

The 3-man tank suggestion is great. So or the other posts of course, but I feel that the 3-man tank idea should've been there from the start. But of course, SOE in their ignorance thought it would be "fun" to have one-man crewed MBT's.

It's no different from a liberator when you have a 3-man MBT, so it'll fit right into the gameplay. Just give the driver, as you said, a reasonably useful secondary gun, just like the liberator, and boom. MBT spam reduced and MBT's can get their needed buff. It's simple SOE, so simple. I know you're in it for the money, but every child can see this is a change for the better.

I agree with everything besides the resource cost on rockets and your idea's about Heavies.

Have any ideas of how we should deal with long range rocket spam that allows people to out snipe tanks? It's particularly bad for Prowler drivers who have AV Turrets, Lancers, and Phoenixs all of which have no defensive counters for us to cert into. I'd greatly appreciate any ideas you have to put forth

There is a counter. its called actually doing combined arms and sending infantry out first. There is rocket spam for tank zergs that think tanks will be able to do everything. Why does everything have to have a cert to defend against? Should phoenix users get to cert into a anti sniper helmet?

I usually run out before the tank column and just rack up kills against strikers and av engineers.

If infantry goes first, then when exactly do tanks come into play?